The Mess of Heroin Addiction

The longer I dwell in this precarious world of loving a heroin addict the more alarmed and shocked I become. I learned last night that one of Sam's sober living housemates died of a heroin overdose a couple of days ago. He had just moved out of the house the day before he died. He seemed to be doing well and had more than a year clean. He left a girlfriend and a family. No kids, thank God. No child should ever lose their parent to heroin. No funeral for the housemates to attend because the young man (26 or so) was from another state.

I can only imagine that family's devastation. They sent their son out of state to one of the best treatment facilities in the world and it failed. They did everything they could and it didn't work. It is my worst nightmare. I have implored Sam to find the address and send a card to the family to offer a small measure of comfort. The notes and messages and comments I have received over the past 3 1/2 months have lifted me more than most would know. I want Sam to understand the power of both giving and receiving support. He said it feels really strange that someone he was just talking to is dead. This man's death hit home for Sam but it slammed me like a Mack truck.

There is no possible way that my 18 year old son can feel this the way I do. Life is so precious. I do not want to know that so many people are losing this battle. This latest example of the tragedy of the heroin epidemic comes in the midst of a transition for Sam that is much more sudden and intense than we had anticipated just last week.

Just hours after my last post I was informed that insurance has denied further treatment effective immediately. We had all anticipated a step down treatment plan to wind things down. These next three or four weeks were to be used for Sam and his counselor to develop his exit plan together. His counselor said he has never had someone so abruptly cut off from benefits and was surprised. After talking with Sam's dad we decided to continue with at least a couple more weeks to allow time for transition. We believe we will win the appeal and will continue to fight it.

There are too many logistics involved for an instant discharge. Sam needs to give his work notice and we need to figure out transportation and living arrangements. The biggest issue, however, is the medication he is taking. If he is not in treatment Hazelden will no longer store or administer his daily suboxone and he can't have it at the sober house either. We are caught between a rock and a hard place and the only way to ensure he will receive his medication in St Paul while we prepare for him to come back to Denver is to authorize further treatment.

This post is not about money or insurance, it is about the fact that appropriate transitions out of treatment are critical. It seems there should be stronger communication between insurance and treatment centers to facilitate these discharges. If a person is on long term maintenance medication they cannot be put in a position that they suddenly have no way to access that medication. This is the exact same medication that I have been told my son absolutely needs in order to live. How are we supposed to navigate this discharge from 1,000 miles away over a weekend?

I will say the situation has created urgency and stress that Sam did not need right now. We didn't need it either, honestly. I understand that insurance can't cover everything forever but a little forewarning is necessary. It feels like after several months of general status quo, things are suddenly starting to wind up again. I knew this was coming but it never gets easy.

Sam feels great these days. He is excited to get home and reconnect with his sober friends again. I am excited to see him. He has been gone nearly 4 months. He wants to live with me but I am encouraging him to consider sober living options as well. I haven't really processed living arrangements yet and I have a lot to think about. At Cornerstone, we parents have a method we call "Shots" and "Walls". We each have 6 shots in the gun. No one ever gets to reload the gun so we have to chose wisely. Shots pertain to absolutes for the household. If this, then that, no negotiations and no discussion. They want us parents to expand our thinking and quit trying to micromanage this situation.

Teenagers are basically crazy anyway. Their hormones are raging, they are self conscious, their brain synapses are not fully formed and the ones that are firing are half loaded. So, as Frank always says, we aren't trying to "cure" the teenage, just the addiction. This is one of the reasons why we get so confused by our kids. Their behavior could be drug related or it could be teenage related. Those two conditions often exacerbate and/or disguise each other. That is why we are encouraged to focus on the specific drug related behavior that we will not tolerate and try to let go of the minor annoyances. Some of us are better at this than others. Not my strong suit, admittedly. Most parents eventually have at least one shot. "You will not use or be high in my house or you are out. Period." Many will say that their kid can come back after 30 days of sobriety. It doesn't mean that the parent is necessarily throwing their kid into the street. It depends on the age and situation. The kids tend to stay with other kids or families in the program. Shots are precise and you have to be willing to follow through. Walls are negotiable.

"Walls" pertain to family rules and values. For example, I expect my minor kids not to smoke cigarettes. It is a wall. For Sam, I negotiated this wall. Not only did I let him smoke and chew as a minor, I paid for and bought it for him myself. Many people in recovery use tobacco. I didn't like it but I had larger battles to spend my energy fighting. Now that he is 18 he has to buy and pay for all tobacco products himself. If Sam does live with me the only shot in my home will be sobriety. How he achieves that is his to decide. I will support him however I can but it is up to him.

After my last post I realized that I was starting to crack under the strain and I needed to literally force myself out of my rut. If I was to wait to have the spark to reclaim my life it would never happen so I begrudgingly started running again. I had every excuse in the book of why I shouldn't be there when I took those first few steps. My main three excuses were that I was tired, lazy, and I suck. It's funny, non runners sometimes look at runners as either highly disciplined athletes (the great ones) or a bunch of self punishing freaks (the rest of us). I suppose both are true to a degree but I think the answer is in the magic. Running is magic to me. It gives me a sense of empowerment and accomplishment that nothing else does. If I could bottle what running feels like and sell it to junkies I could put heroin dealers out of business. Just as addiction builds momentum in life, so do positive habits. I am not a good runner or a fast runner. Some might even see me running and question if that is what I am actually doing . Some runs are very difficult and miserable and others are amazing and breathtaking but I have loved each and every one. If not during, then after.

Running has saved me from myself for more than 30 years now. Run for an hour, stay high for a day, and it's free. As parents of addicts we have to connect with that thing that saves us or we get lost in their addiction too. It is really easy to feel like we are losing our soul along with all the other things we lose through our kid's addiction such as time, peace, energy, motivation, and trust. If we can just find our way back to our passion it will us help reconnect to all those other things too. It is very difficult to hold on to that part of ourselves. It feels selfish but nothing could be further than the truth.

Being Sam's mom has humbled me greatly. I used to think I knew much more about addiction and heroin. I used to think the issue was cut and dry but now I know that nothing could be further from the truth. Every story is different and every situation is different. There are some basic truths we can weave through any story of addiction but so much variation outside of those basic truths.

Tonight Glenn Beck had the director of a treatment facility from California on his radio program. In his opening monologue Beck, a recovering opioid addict himself, made a reference differentiating between the medically driven opioid addict and the street addict. It sounded to me that he sees his own addiction as more justified than my son's (the street addict) because it involved medically prescribed opioids? This kind of attitude really pisses me off to be honest. I see it as drowning in calm water versus drowning in a raging sea. Does it matter how it happened?

As a mom who nearly lost my son to a heroin overdose it makes absolutely no difference to me how we got here. I would have no more pride or peace knowing that we ended up here under different circumstances. I just want my son to live.

Today, I continue cherish the progress Sam has made. The reality of heroin addiction is harsh and ugly but there are remarkable stories of recovery as well. My son has a chance for a great life if he continues to prioritize his sobriety one day at a time for the rest of his life. It will be a long and difficult journey and he will need to keep his guard up for the rest of his life but it is possible.

Sobriety is not just the most important thing, it is the only thing.

I remain committed toward my own path of sanity too and am thankful that I have reconnected with my running self. All it took was once to reignite the spark. That is the power of passion. My hope is that Sam finds his passion in life too. The thing that he can return to over and over to refill his soul. Life is good, life is short, and life is precious.

Thank you for reading and continuing to support us on this journey. Where there is life, there is hope. Love you.#nomoreshame