For 16 years Rukhsana Ali managed to hide her husband Wajid’s heroin addiction from their son and daughter, all the while ignoring her family’s repeated pleas to leave him.
It paid off when Wajid kicked the habit last year, one of a growing number of drug users in Pakistan saved by determined spouses who resist social pressures and potential ostracism by their relatives.
“I fought all the way and finally proved my own family wrong that Wajid would never quit drugs,” Rukhsana told Agence France-Presse at their house in Karachi, as she hugged her son Andeel (18) and daughter Areeba (15).
Pakistan has at least 3,5-million to four million drug addicts, out of a population of more than 150 million, said Brigadier Mohammad Farooq, head of the Anti-Narcotics Force.
A major problem is its proximity to Afghanistan, which supplies 90% of the world’s opium, used to make heroin. Long a transit point for Afghan narcotics to the West, Pakistan has easily available and cheap heroin.
A 1g “wrap” can cost as little as 80 rupees ($1,30).
However, with Pakistan’s chronically underfunded and crumbling health system, there are few means to support drug users or help them recover from their debilitating addiction.
It ends up being the woman’s job to wean her husband off drugs — not an easy task in this conservative Islamic republic where rights groups regularly complain of discrimination against women and domestic violence.
Rukhsana’s husband refused to quit drugs or go to work, spending days at a time away from home and becoming a shadow of his former self. To cope, Rukhsana got a job as a teacher, while looking after the family.
“My family advised me to divorce him as he may not survive,” she said.
“I refused but told him to stay with his father in [the central city of] Multan as I never wanted that my children should know about his addiction. I used to visit him in Multan regularly,” she said.
“The most difficult thing for me during all this period was to keep all this secret from my children,” she says.
Wajid (50) eventually entered a treatment centre. He is in no doubt that his wife saved his life — and says he wants to help others do the same.
“My wife’s determination forced me to quit drugs after 16 years. She faced all the hardship, social pressures, looked after our children, did a job to keep the kitchen moving,” he said.
His daughter is also delighted to have her father off drugs. “I was very young and hardly knew anything about addiction. But I am so happy that when I am grown up I will see my father with me in a healthy condition,” she said.
While women often control the purse strings in Pakistan, the husband’s role as the head of the household is never questioned, making the challenge of the addict’s spouse even tougher.
If it emerges that their husband is on drugs, women further face the stigma and ostracism from their family.
There is also a growing problem with HIV/Aids, due to the number of people sharing dirty needles, up to five at a time, experts say. Their wives are then unknowingly exposed to potential infection.
“It’s not easy for a woman in this society to be called wife of an addict, said Munnera Huda, whose husband Javed Ali Huda smoked heroin for several years.
“I became a nurse when our financial position started getting bad and my in-laws gave me permission. I worked for 10 years” she said. “Since he is now normal and got a job I decided to look after our two children.”
Javed, who smoked 10 heroin cigarettes a day on average, now works with a non-governmental organisation, the Pakistan Society, which runs several rehabilitation centres.
Family support is crucial in the rehabilitation process, Huda said. There are hundreds of cases where families dump their loved ones in the centres and do not welcome them back.
“After getting married it was my wife who took all the pain and what I am today is because of my wife,” Huda said.
But it was more difficult for Mohammad Shahzad’s conservative family to cope the situation when he became a heroin addict six years ago.
Shahzad, who owned an electronics shop, sold his business, home and even his wife’s jewellery.
His wife, who wears an Islamic veil and did not want to be named, said: “It was due to my prayers and his love for our two children that he finally quit drugs.
“At times when he did not return for six months. I was scared whether he was alive or not.”
Shahzad finally kicked heroin when a friend found him near a shrine in the eastern city of Lahore and told him that his son was sick.
“It was like a dream come true for the family when he quit. It’s all because of my prayers and his love for the children,” his wife added.
The key to successfully weaning addicts off heroin is psychological and social rehabilitation, says Shahzad Chaudhry, who runs the busy Sadaqat drugs clinic in Karachi and previously treated Wajid Ali.
This means, again, that the onus is on the wife to understand, he added.
“Social acceptance of such a person is very important. We try to change his belief … he can not only survive without drugs but can also live a normal life,” Chaudhry said. — AFP