Right. Don't be ashamed because you don't tell anyone. It's nobody's business but yours and your supplier's.

Anyone shooting up street junk with strangers (or with friends for that matter) is an idiot adopting a "lifestyle" that is guaranteed to end, if not in death, then in a period of mighty suffering and squalor. This is especially true of the working class.

Affluent junkies have no such worries because their doctors supply them with prescription dope, which obviously does not carry the same risk as street dope. And methadone is just morphine with a longer half-life. The newer opioid substitutes are much worse and withdrawal from them takes much longer because their half-lives are as long or longer than methadone's. At least fentanyl and heroin have short half-lives and a habit can be kicked in a week by a healthy young person, but nobody tests the dosage and purity of street dope.

Some rich people go slumming because they have fallen for the junkie mystique, but that road ends up at the same cemetery. Better to stick with Dr. Feelgood until his scruples get the better of his greed (hey, don't laugh . . . it happens).