HBO’s ‘Euphoria’ Is Like Birth Control
How anyone could watch this beautiful series and still want to procreate is beyond me
Euphoria is currently my favorite trauma porn. For anyone who’s ever suffered from addiction or loved someone who has, the gorgeous drama may be a weekly-recurring nightmare. We cringe and sweat through each episode, yet dare not look away. Once the credits roll, we’re on a violet — yes, I’m gonna say it — high. Yet once that prickly stimuli takes ease, I begin to fill with gratitude. Grateful that I’ve never been addicted to anything except love and achievement; grateful for my parent’s sobriety; thankful that hard drugs, outside of the well-off crack dealers we admired as youth, weren’t a part of my social life as a teen. I complete each ep relieved that I’m no longer a teenager, but even more so that I’m not a parent.
How could any mother or father watch a Euphoria episode without their insecurities and nightmares being poked? The self interrogation alone would drive me towards a pill party. Did I fuck up as a parent? Am I currently fucking up? Whenever one pictures themselves with children of their own, the visions are normally of boiling bottles, messy diapers, happy tears and the sunniest of smiles. When does anyone factor having to keep their toddler from eating roaches out of the ashtray? Or the possibility of permanently maiming their child’s cerebral cortex…
