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"The Basketball Game" is a graphic novel adaptation of the award-winning National Film Board of Canada animated short of the same name – intended for audiences aged 12 years and up. It's a poignant tale of the power of community as a means to rise above hatred and bigotry. In the end, as is recognized by the kids playing the basketball game, we're all in this together.

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Tag: substance abuse

Artfully exploring heritage

Artfully exploring heritage

Lindsey Tyne Johnson (photo from Lindsey Tyne Johnson)

Returning from a Birthright trip to Israel in 2019, artist Lindsey Tyne Johnson was inspired. Learning the aleph-bet, she made a laser-engraved spirit board in Hebrew, but accidentally arranged the letters left to right, as they would be in English, and not right to left, as Hebrew is read. The mistake spurred her not only to create the exhibit Hebrew Spelled Backwards, which is on display at the Kamloops Art Gallery until April 1, but to explore her cultural heritage, from which she had been estranged, and learn more about Judaism.

The other, more sombre, inspiration for the Hebrew spirit board and the exhibit was, Johnson writes in a blog post, a “desire to feel closer to my brother after the events that left him homeless and his eventual passing.”

“Born with the name Liam, my brother changed his name to his chosen Hebrew name, Noah as an adult,” she writes on her website (lindseytynejohnson.com). “My mother had mentioned our Jewish ancestry to us as children, but my brother was the only person to explore it…. I can still remember it as what my mother called ‘one of his many phases’ in his late teenage years. She chalked it up to a phase, but it’s the string I use to tie memories of my brother together.”

“My brother was the first person I witnessed who explored their Jewish heritage,” Johnson told the Independent. “When he moved to Vancouver in his early 20s, he legally changed his name to his Hebrew name, Noah. He struggled a lot with his mental health, and there were times when I felt like I was losing the brother I grew up with. It was an attempt to feel closer to him that I went on Birthright and had a bat mitzvah. I wanted to remember the part of him that was happy, passionate and excited about life.

“My brother lost his life to fentanyl in 2021. It was devastating and broke my family apart,” said Johnson, who has two other siblings. “Many struggle to understand substance abuse/mental illness’s connection to generational or cyclical trauma. It’s unfair to look down upon those who might suffer from those things. I try my best to advocate for the destigmatization of mental illness where I can, though I’ve had to be careful not to let others’ ideas also negatively affect my mental health.”

While not a large exhibit, Hebrew Spelled Backwards is powerful, thought-provoking in a serious way, but also using humour. For the exhibit’s images, Johnson explains on her website, “The sandy colour palette was chosen as a tribute to the desert, a significant location in Jewish history and culture. I use digital media to blend traditional Jewish motifs with modern techniques, creating a dynamic visual experience.”

Johnson said, “Like many artists, my process is sporadic and requires a particular head space to create something I’m happy with. I often have ideas for pieces while doing mundane daily activities; if I don’t write them down, they’re lost forever. I practise a lot of sequential art, which is usually silly comics about everyday life, but they’re generally never seen by other humans. My style reflects the graphic novels I like to consume. I can’t help but be inspired by artists like Craig Thompson and Marjane Satrapi, both visually and thematically. My dream is to produce a graphic novel one day.”

The Hebrew Spelled Backwards exhibit comprises not only Johnson’s artwork, but her voice. Each picture has a QR code and viewers can hear Johnson give explanations of the Hebrew words and some context for the images, making the exhibit more accessible and inclusive. The illustrations variously include Jewish symbols and/or Hebrew text, supernatural elements, pop art iconography (a Warholesque can of Birthright’s Instant Bat-Mitzvah, for example) and current topics of concern, like rapper Ye’s antisemitic comments, poignantly drawn as a short series of cellphone text messages from a mom to her child that ends with the child asking, “mum, why is ye mad at us?” This is one of the works that, as the exhibit description reads, “examines the complexities of identifying as Jewish and the fear and uncertainty that often come with it.”

“I have a couple of fears about identifying myself as Jewish,” Johnson told the Independent. “Initially, when diving into Jewish culture and Judaism as a religion, I was afraid people might not think I was ‘Jewish enough,’ since only one of my parents has Jewish ancestry. My siblings and I were raised without Jewish traditions or education…. Having a bat mitzvah really helped with that fear, though. I’m also grateful that I’ve never really encountered anyone from the Jewish communities I’ve belonged to that has made me feel that way.

image - “RaeF” by Lindsey Tyne Johnson
“RaeF” by Lindsey Tyne Johnson

“The other part of that fear was that people would think differently of me or assume certain tropes or ideologies about me if I publicly identified myself as Jewish. This is an unfortunate reality I’ve experienced, even if subtly. Most commonly, people think I’m OK with antisemitic jokes or jokes that involve the Holocaust. It’s an exhausting thing to experience.”

Putting together the exhibit has allowed Johnson not only to explore her fears, but also her own biases.

“Creating these pieces required me to reflect on the experiences of people like Batsheva Dueck (aka Cynical Duchess, a modest fashion content creator) or more conservative Jews, who experience more assumptions made about them based on their dress or religious beliefs,” she said. “Since working on this exhibition, I’ve been more sensitive to times when I’ve excused antisemitic values expressed by my peers or acquaintances. When I lived in Brooklyn, I lived with someone who spoke quite negatively about Hasidic communities. This has been an excellent opportunity to witness my biases and encourage others to reflect on their biases or assumptions, too.

“It’s also allowed me to tie other pieces of my identity together,” she continued. “I’ve been able to connect my Irish ancestry with my Jewish ancestry, for example. It has given me a sense of wholeness or completeness and I’ve accepted that I can be many things all at the same time and I’ve accepted that that’s OK. We all contain multitudes.”

Johnson went to Ireland this past summer to visit where her Ashkenazi family moved to in the 19th century, and “to visit the Irish Jewish Museum and Waterford treasures.”

“I was probably in the fourth grade when my mother talked to my siblings and me about it,” said Johnson of first learning about her Jewish heritage. “It was after I had come home and talked about how we were learning about World War II at school. It was surreal to hear my mother, an immigrant from England, talk about a side of our ancestry that had never really been discussed before. I didn’t understand what it meant at the time.”

Johnson herself has lived many places. She was born in Edmonton in 1993, but her family moved to Saskatchewan and then Prince George, B.C., shortly after.

“I spent most of my youth in Prince George but moved to Dawson City, Yukon, as soon as I could save up enough money to attend the Yukon School of Visual Arts,” she said. “Yukon SOVA is a one-year foundational arts program. Still, I decided to stay in the Yukon upon completion and remained in the territory for about five years before I moved to Brooklyn in 2018. I was in Brooklyn for only half a year before moving to Kamloops to be closer to my family, but it made a lasting impression. Going from a territory of 35,000 people to my neighbourhood in Williamsburg with four times that amount was dizzying.”

Johnson said she loves the Kamloops Jewish community. “I joined shortly after moving to Kamloops from Brooklyn and felt incredibly welcomed,” she said. “The [Okanagan Jewish Community Centre] president, Heidi Coleman, is a huge inspiration and comfort to me. It’s pretty relaxed in terms of how often we have gatherings. We don’t have a synagogue or a place to meet, so we usually celebrate holidays at someone’s house. The ‘younger’ (20 to 30 years old) of us have a close bond, and I often have a group of us over for various holidays, too.”

Johnson is currently in her third year at Thompson Rivers University, where she is doing a bachelor’s in criminology. “I’m most interested in victimology,” she said. “I think Canada and most of the world fail victims of crime to an astronomical degree. It’s wild to think about how much attention we give criminals without considering how we could better support the survivor or victims of their crimes.”

Artistically, she is planning a piece that more specifically honours her brother Noah. “I want to educate the general public about how the consequences of generational or cyclical trauma can lead to mental health struggles like substance abuse,” she said. “I would like to highlight that it’s not specifically someone’s ‘fault’ for struggling the way they do.”

For more on Johnson, visit lindseytynejohnson.com. Kamloops Art Gallery’s website is kag.bc.ca.

Format ImagePosted on February 24, 2023February 22, 2023Author Cynthia RamsayCategories Visual ArtsTags digital art, family, Hebrew, history, intergenerational trauma, Kamloops Art Gallery, Lindsey Tyne Johnson, social commentary, stigma, substance abuse
Dealing with addiction

Dealing with addiction

Dr. Jenny Melamed (photo from Jenny Melamed)

“I’ve been in addiction medicine for at least 15 to 20 years now. I spend my time with people in addiction and recovery; that is all the work that I do. I believe in recovery and I believe in remission for the disease of addiction,” Dr. Jenny Melamed told the Independent.

Melamed, who now lives in Vancouver, was born and raised in Johannesburg, South Africa. She moved to Canada with her husband in 1987 – first to rural Saskatchewan, then to Vancouver. Her work with addiction began with a friend’s suggestion to try some work at a methadone clinic. She immediately was drawn to help people in this way and became certified in addiction medicine in the United States, then in Canada and internationally.

“I’ve got lots of initials behind my name,” said Melamed. “I’ve spent most of my time in addiction talking, doing person-to-person counseling. I don’t wear a stethoscope.”

According to Melamed, physicians were among the first abusers of prescription drugs. “It was thought that treating pain with opioids would not be addictive,” she said.

“Opioids are narcotics that act on opioid receptors to produce morphine-like effects, so we were prescribing it and, now, there are so many opioids out there. And we’re having these pill parties, where kids are taking pills from their parents’ cupboards – going to these parties where they’re putting them into these big bowls and they don’t even know what they are taking out. We’re looking at 13- or 14-year-olds that are trying these drugs. They’re finding it young.

“There’s not that much OxyContin available anymore,” she added, “as people are now scared of it.”

Melamed said there is no way to know for sure if a person will become addicted or not. Kids often take more than one possible addictive drug at these kinds of parties, she said, so they will likely not even know which one(s) affected them and what the specific effects were.

“For some people who take their first drink or take their first opioid, they will say that ‘the minute I used X, I felt calm for the first time,’” she said. “For some, it starts immediately. For others, it starts as weekend use at parties. Then, they start to use a little more during the week, and then they start realizing that, when they try to stop, they can’t. They’re actually dependent on this drug and are going through withdrawal. They can’t move away from it.”

Melamed said, “Addiction is a disease of escape. They’re using it to help them cope. I said to a young girl yesterday, ‘Why do you use?’ She said, ‘Sometimes, I just don’t want to feel.’ And that’s what it is. They learn from an early age, and the addiction part of the brain takes over and says, ‘I will help you through this.’

“We all live in a society where there’s a lot of stress and many of us, especially young people that have not developed coping mechanisms, turn to different modes of escape, as they are the easiest thing to do.

“The important thing to remember is that, when you come down from whatever high you used, you still have the stress, if not even worse, as now you’ve got to pay for your drugs. You may have blacked out or overdosed … but, in the spur of the moment, addiction is such an instant gratification that you don’t even think of it. You just think about self-medicating.”

Recovering addicts learn that there is no such thing as a cure from addiction. Addiction may go into remission in the same way that type 2 diabetes can go into remission, said Melamed. If one changes their diet and loses weight, etc., they may not have to use insulin anymore, but, if they gain weight back, change their diet or lifestyle, the diabetes will flare up again.

“So, you get the person who is out with buddies and somebody says, ‘You want to try this heroin?’ not knowing there’s fentanyl in there,” she said. “And they die, because the brain tells them that they can try it just once. And they actually believe that they can go back to being a social user, or a social drinker.

“They don’t understand that this is a chronic disease that is with them for the rest of their life. And, you know, when you say to a 15-year-old, ‘you’re not going to be able to use or drink for the rest of your life,’ it’s a very difficult concept and very scary … and that’s why the AA [Alcoholics Anonymous] concept of one day at a time is really important.”

While only about eight to 11% of people who use a substance become addicted to it, no one knows which substance will entrap them. But, one thing is for certain – it can affect any of us and the problem affects us all.

“I think the first thing we have to understand is that it doesn’t matter what religion we are, what our economic status is – everybody has a risk of addiction,” said Melamed. “We have some very wealthy families in the city who have lost kids to addiction. We have to move it out of the stigma.

“You have the concept of, ‘Oh, he’s a functional alcoholic, just drinks at lunchtime.’ And, we accept that. But, we shouldn’t accept that in any form. And, we also shouldn’t stigmatize it in any form. We need to talk to our children about it and be on top of it.

“In some ways, as a Jewish population, we feel like we’re a little different and protected,” she continued. “We’re not. The conversation has to happen at home. When I gave a talk here, at the Schara Tzedek, about addiction, the room was empty. We believe our kids would never do it.”

There are things you can do at home, in addition to talking with your kids about addiction. Any prescription drugs that are not being used should be returned to a pharmacy for proper disposal, and any medications that are being used on a regular basis should be locked up.

“You also should take a look at why you are using these medications,” she said. “Even as adults, our drug use is inappropriate.”

Melamed said one of the best ways to keep an eye on your kids is by making your home a welcoming space where they and their friends are happy to hang out. That way, they are comfortable being around you and you see what is going on.

“You need to know where your children are, who their friends are and what they are doing,” she said. “And, you cannot assume that, just because they are from the same socioeconomic status, that everybody’s good. It’s really important to know parents, their friends and to know what’s going on.”

Melamed is open to hearing from educators, schools, community groups and others who would like her to come and speak on addiction and its treatment.

Rebeca Kuropatwa is a Winnipeg freelance writer.

Format ImagePosted on December 7, 2018December 4, 2018Author Rebeca KuropatwaCategories LocalTags addiction, alcoholism, healthcare, Jenny Melamed, prescription drugs, substance abuse
How best to treat addiction

How best to treat addiction

The Feb. 22 panel discussion at Congregation Schara Tzedeck featured, left to right, moderator Dr. Auby Axler and panelists Rabbi Andrew Rosenblatt, Dr. Jenny Melamed, David Berner and Rebecca Denham. (photo by Zach Sagorin)

Approximately 5,000 Jews in the local Jewish community need support around addiction, according to Jewish Addiction Community Services Vancouver.

JACS offers various support programs for those battling addiction, and their families and friends, and organizes events for community education and awareness. On the evening of Feb. 22, at Congregation Schara Tzedeck, the agency partnered with Schara Tzedeck and the Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver for a panel discussion on the fentanyl crisis and addiction in the Jewish community in general. Participating panelists were Rabbi Andrew Rosenblatt, addiction medical specialist Dr. Jenny Melamed, addiction therapist David Berner and director of services at JACS, Rebecca Denham; the moderator was Dr. Auby Axler.

“JACS Vancouver is a new agency trying to tackle a taboo and shame-filled topic that can ignite passionate responses and strong resistance,” explained Denham in an email. It is committed to supporting community needs relating to substance use, and values a diversity of perspectives on addiction treatment.

At the panel discussion, Rosenblatt spoke about some of the community concerns and the internal conflicts that some people experience when trying to determine the best approaches to addiction support.

Melamed, an addiction doctor who has been treating people with opioid addiction for 15 years, said, “People have been dying from heroin, people have been dying from all drugs…. There are many drugs out there that are as dangerous. Alcohol is one of the most dangerous drugs out there, 90% of the trauma seen in the [emergency room] after midnight is from alcohol. A heroin addict is a calm, sedated person who is nodding off in a corner, he’s not violent; he’s a danger to himself, and he’s not a danger to anybody else.”

She explained, “Addiction is a … disease situated in the primitive part of the brain…. The addiction goes and sits there and it says, ‘if you do not use me, you will die, you need me.’ This is where the team comes in…. We’ve got the ability to say, ‘I’m not going to listen to you anymore.’ But the power to overcome that is what is needed and it is strong and it requires meetings, it requires therapy, it requires a team, it really is a village to keep somebody sober in the long term.”

About 40 people attended the discussion and Melamed commented, “When you look at how big the Jewish community is and how small the attendance is here tonight … we live with our heads in the sand and we don’t realize how many of us have family members who are in addiction.

“We need to remove the stigma related to addiction. When we tried to get somebody in recovery to talk tonight, we couldn’t find anybody in the Jewish community who would come and stand up, because we put that big addiction sticker on people’s forehead. But we all know that it can happen to anybody. Yes, there is an enormous genetic component, a 40% genetic component when it comes to addiction, but there is trauma. Sexual abuse happens in any religion. Everything happens across the board.”

While the Downtown Eastside is often considered the centre of addiction and drug use, Melamed said this is not the reality. “The people on the DTES make up maybe one to five percent of the drug-using population. Seventy-five percent of people using drugs are what we call functional … nobody knows what is going on out there. If you can afford your heroin habit, then you’re OK until you overdose and it takes you over to the other side.”

Berner, founder and executive director of a residential treatment centre for drug addicts and alcoholics, has conducted almost 11,000 therapy groups.

“Addictions are coping mechanisms…. I’ve never met someone in addiction who hasn’t had a terrible upbringing, who hasn’t had severe trauma, serious trauma,” Berner said. “I’ve rarely met anyone who has addiction who hasn’t suffered physical or sexual abuse, or emotional-psychological abuse, or financial abuse.”

Berner posed the rhetorical question, “Can you change? No.” But, he said, “You can change the things you do, including picking up [drugs or alcohol].”

He said, “Every week I give a lecture, every Tuesday morning, and then do group therapy. One of the things I say week in and week out is, I don’t want to hear about your substance.”

Berner also commented on the government’s spending on addiction services in Vancouver.

“We’ve got harm reduction, that’s it!” he said. “And then prevention, treatment and the law are not only ignored officially … they are officially denigrated by the health department, by the ministry of health, and anyone that can make a decision.”

In response to an audience question – “How does the word recreational fit in with the level of risk that’s involved in drugs?” – Melamed responded, “I think you have to replace the word recreational now with Russian roulette because that’s the word we’re using. There is no safe use.”

“Even with marijuana?” asked another audience member.

Melamed said she knows, based on urine samples she has taken, that “some of the marijuana is laced with fentanyl.”

However, a man in the audience, identifying himself as a federal prosecutor who works with the police on narcotics, countered that assertion. “My understanding, after looking at various police files on where this has been reported, [is that] marijuana laced with fentanyl … is anecdotal. It is from people who have overdosed in a non-fatal manner and have reported it to hospital authorities, doctors, police officers, [saying] ‘all I used was marijuana,’ and this is to avoid, in my understanding, the stigma of being labeled a hard drug user…. There has been no actual seizure by police in B.C. of marijuana laced with fentanyl.”

However, the prosecutor added, “We see cocaine laced with fentanyl, we see a lot of heroin laced with fentanyl, we see methamphetamine laced with fentanyl.”

With Purim approaching, Rosenblatt noted, “Drinking on Purim happens a lot, especially in the Orthodox Jewish community, because there is a statement in the Talmud – a person is obligated to drink on Purim until they don’t know the difference between cursed be Haman, who is the villain of the story, and blessed by Mordechai, who is the hero.”

He said, “Maimonides says the way you should be happy on Purim is by spending most of your effort feeding the poor on Purim. Why? You would think that maybe Maimonides was democratic and would say something very nice like the poor deserve a holiday, too.… That’s not what Maimonides says at all. Maimonides says that there is no greater joy in the world than helping another person.”

“JACS was born out of a necessity and I think it is important to remind you that JACS is here to support you,” said Denham in wrapping up the event. “If a question doesn’t get answered tonight or if an issue gets triggered for you, reach out to us and we will support you just as the community has supported us. We wouldn’t be here today without the kind accepting spirit that runs deep throughout this community. From the support of the rabbinical leaders, professionals, individuals, family foundations, the support of the Federation … all of whom continue to strengthen JACS services … we are bringing this much-needed discussion away from shame and into a supportive light.”

To learn more about JACS Vancouver, Denham can be reached at [email protected].

Zach Sagorin is a Vancouver freelance writer.

Format ImagePosted on March 10, 2017March 8, 2017Author Zach SagorinCategories LocalTags addiction, fentanyl, health, JACS, Rebecca Denham, substance abuse
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