It’s taken eight months of being a mom of an angel to come to where I can think beyond myself and offer support to others swimming in this sea. My son lost his life to addiction in November, 2013. That was the most difficult and challenging experience of my life; however, the second hardest was when I lost him the first time. The horrible disease of addiction changes who the addict is, how s/he th
inks, behaves, measures “right” and “wrong,” lives, exists, eats, sleeps, breathes,….everything. Not all addictions are created equal. Some are slow, silent killers. Some cause death within minutes. My son’s drug of choice: heroine. I had six months from the time I learned of his disease to the time I lost him forever. During those six months I read everything I could get my hands on. I wanted to do everything, all the right things, and support his recovery, and he did want to recover. Nothing I read gave me much hope, however. That is the reality of this particular addiction. It is lethal. In retrospect, I realize that as much as friends and family wanted to support me, and him, in this battle to manage his disease, it was in the daily struggles, the emotions I wasn’t willing to talk about or didn't have time to know I was having -- that was where I needed the most support. Unfortunately, I couldn’t explain that what happened in my son’s drastic changes of behavior and outlook was a very real loss. He was lost to me long before he was lost forever. He was two people in one body. I could see and remember my loving, big hearted, do-anything-for-anyone, funny, always smiling, outdoor-loving, artistic, musical, athletic son. But, a result of his disease, he was also my sneaky, deceptive, lying, stealing, lethargic, angry, guilt-ridden, depressive, ashamed young man. I lost my child long before he passed. It was lonely and frightening to feel my way through this loss that other people couldn't see and feel with me. But, an addiction happens to all the people around an addict, their companions. A plethora of books and support groups exist that tell the addict's support group about enabling, tough love, accountability, and the like. Plenty of support and self-help texts are available for people who have lost loved ones, but that wasn’t really what I needed. My son was still alive and I was facing, daily/hourly/minute-by-minute, any number of emotions, fears, strange and terrible new problems. Self-help books that address grief after a death weren't really what I needed, nor were books about relating to my addicted son. These books were educational but didn’t address the daily struggles that come before an addict's triumph or defeat. What doesn’t exist? A book that acknowledges and recognizes the sense of loss, stress, concern, love, confusion, anger, pity, exhaustion, hope, guilt, and myriad other emotions experienced by those of us who fight beside our friends and family in their illness while it's happening. A space for us to return to our own souls and inner voices to reinvigorate and to comfort ourselves, to admit to ourselves truths other's won't understand. I envision a daily reading for reflection, artwork that brings daily beauty to readers who are in an overwhelmingly ugly life situation. We will design a coat of arms/crest (in keeping with the medieval structure) that is, within this book symbolic of those of us who make up a community of fighters, survivors, and learners-by-necessity. We are companions, to our struggling and fallen addicts, and to each other. This will be not a Book of Hours, but rather a Book of Ours.
