The Heavy Chains of Opioid Addiction

This is my beautiful baby girl – taking some of her first steps at her grandmother’s house in 1990. Don’t you love that 1970’s era carpet?

My daughter was around nine months old in this photo. She had her whole life ahead of her. And I, as her mother, contemplated many wonderful scenarios for her future.

None of those scenarios, however, included opioid addiction.

This is also my baby girl – she’s still beautiful.

We were able to meet up with her in the Twin Cities shortly after Christmas for a couple hours. She has no permanent address or active cell phone plan so connecting with her can be challenging.

I communicate by Facebook Messenger in the hopes that she will read my IM’s when she’s in Wi-Fi range. Sometimes she responds back. Sometimes she doesn’t. This time she did.

I am grateful for every opportunity God grants me to hug her and tell her I love her.

Setting the Stage for Addiction

While my current home life is quite stable, that wasn’t the case while raising my two adult children. My first husband – my high school sweetheart – was a funny, intelligent and talented man who loved helping others (others outside his family). He was also an alcoholic. Merge those two together and you get someone who spends a LOT of time away from home, frequently involved in things that aren’t beneficial. (Genetics likely play a strong role in my daughter’s addictions.)

My daughter struggled early on in school and was diagnosed by 4th grade with ADHD. She has a heart of gold but she is also extremely stubborn and defiant. Despite special education services for several years and a little outside tutoring, she began skipping classes by spring of 7th grade. Counseling and meds failed – she wasn’t interested and wasn’t cooperative. I worked long hours and traveled intermittently leaving no time to be involved as I should have been. By 8th grade when she landed in truancy court (I’d drop her at school each morning and she’d disappear somewhere in the building rather than attend class), her father was walking out of the marriage and in with another woman.

I lost it – went into survival mode – focusing on my job to provide food and shelter for my teenagers which was about all I could muster. With a history of depression and anxiety issues, the double whammy of losing my husband at the same time my daughter checked out of school (and my being helpless to change either of them) took its toll. I fell into a pit of despair.

Timing couldn’t have been worse. Dad left. Mom emotionally disintegrated. No one was there to pick up the pieces for the kids. My son, being 18 and on his way to college, fared rather well, all things considered. He’s married and successfully supporting himself as a web developer.

My daughter continued down the path of self-destruction. She was placed in an alternative program in hopes that it would be a better fit. Ultimately she chose to quit school at 16 years of age – something I as a parent in Iowa was powerless to legally prevent.

Point fingers if you want. I’ve beat myself up with guilt over the years – still do at times. There are certainly things I’d do differently now. Hindsight is 20-20. Even so, we are all responsible for our own behavior – the choices she made were ultimately her own. Addiction makes most of her choices now.

Addiction Takes Root

She was already dabbling in alcohol and prescription pain pills with friends behind my back by this point. I’d leave for work and she’d vanish before I returned, sometimes being gone for days. I had no idea what to do or where to turn for help. I called the police on several occasions to report here as a runaway. Yet, as a single mom, quitting the job that was my only way of providing housing, food and health insurance for my kids wasn’t a viable option. She ran wild while I was gone.

Over time, and fueled initially by sorrow and desperation, my relationship with the Lord grew. Beauty does indeed come from ashes. He allowed me to meet my current husband – a stable and trustworthy Christian man. I changed jobs and my travel ended and my work-life balance improved. My kids have seen me go from a crazy woman to, well…someone who appears mostly normal. Oh, there’s still a lot of growth to be had – but I see progress.

Yet I have not been able to “fix” my daughter. As a 17 year old, she was involved with the legal system for a few misdemeanor charges. I hoped those would be enough to spur her to change. She was required to get her GED as a part of her “sentence” which was good. Ultimately though, no one forces the girl to do what she doesn’t want to do. Giving up the friends and the lifestyle wasn’t on her agenda. I believe it’s her way of coping with all the pain she’s experienced throughout life. The problem is, it’s a downward spiral.

Addiction resulted in lies and deception, verbal abuse, theft of our money and personal property, and people I didn’t know or trust being allowed in my house at all hours – either while I wasn’t there or while I was asleep. I installed a key lock on my bedroom door to protect my money and valuables while I was gone only to have her kick in the door and break the door jam. Nothing was safe. But we didn’t know yet the extent of things…

Addiction Smacked Us in the Face

Around the same time I overheard that she was pregnant with the son we later adopted, I found the bag full of needles and the spoon hidden above the cabinets in our kitchen. Nothing, absolutely nothing, prepares you for the discovery that your child is injecting heroin.

That was almost 14 years ago. Over those years my baby has mourned the loss of several close friends from overdose or suicide. I helplessly watched her fail at parenting (not a surprise, but heartbreaking nonetheless). She’s run back and forth from here to Minnesota countless times and burned dozens of bridges with friends who might have been supportive. She’s skipped out on or failed to show up for at least a half dozen rehab opportunities. We’ve had her involuntarily committed twice for her own safety (in hopes that once sober, she’d be willing to try rehab – to no avail). I’ve purchased more cell phones and cell phone plans than I can count in an attempt to keep the lines of communication open with her (phones last about 6 weeks before they are broken or “disappear”). The amount I’ve spent on rent, food, and who knows what else would have gone a long way toward putting her through college.

Lessons Learned

Over those 14 years what have I learned? First, never assume it can’t happen to your child. If something seems “off”, it probably is. Don’t trust their lips – trust your gut. I’ve also learned that no matter how hard I try, no matter how much control I try and exert over the situation, I can’t change it on my own. I can only change me (and even that isn’t possible without God’s help).

Her life struggles – her pain- used to consume me. I was constantly on alert waiting for the next crisis, the next shoe to drop, because there always is one. It might be relationship turmoil (relationships between addicts aren’t healthy), it might be jail, it might be her calling to say she’s pregnant again (she only has the one son so you can understand my pain with this on so many levels), or it might be the agonizing calls I’ve received where she’s crying and telling me she doesn’t want to live any longer…and then she abruptly hangs up…and I have no idea where she is.

I struggle with inflammatory issues (and possibly auto-immune, though I don’t have a formal diagnosis yet). I fully believe the decades of chronic stress I’ve experienced – and not handled appropriately – have impacted my health. My blood pressure spikes when I encounter stress, even for little things. I have chest pressure and my heart arrhythmias ramp up. It’s like my body can’t handle it and just dumps adrenaline. The “fight or flight” has gotten touchier the older I’ve become.

I reached the point where I realized I had to back away from her situation (including thinking about her much of the time) in order to be healthy enough to care for my husband and teenage son. I love her very, very much and I still feel that sickening ache in my stomach when I ponder too long on her lifestyle and what she does to support it. I encourage her to seek help and I forward websites and phone numbers of places that might assist. I Uber her sometimes when she needs to get from point A to point B. And if she calls asking for $10 for food, I CashApp it to her and don’t ask many questions. I make attempts to see her a few times a year – even if it means a 500 mile round trip to only see her for 30 minutes. I know it could always be the last time. I pray it’s not.

Finding My Way Forward

However, I no longer pay for cell phones or rent. I don’t let the crisis calls push me into sending her $200 for “a room in a friend’s apartment” anymore. I’m getting better at praying to God and placing things in His hands rather than freaking out. I will likely never do another involuntary commitment, nor will I call the police on her unless I fear she’s dying (and even then I likely wouldn’t because I never have an address for her). And, she will not live in my house unless she’s completed treatment and a reasonable period of time in a structured sober living environment. I won’t have the chaos here. I need to know she’s serious about change.

Instead, I pray for her regularly, that God will break the chains of addiction and that He will draw her to Himself. Ultimately, what she needs (what all addicts need) is a relationship with the Lord! They need the love and forgiveness of Christ working in their heart. I can’t change her, but His working in her heart certainly could. And I thank Him for protecting her to this point. She’s been brought back with Narcan by friends more than once. She could have been the next overdose.

I also pray for myself, that I don’t lose heart. It’s easy to give up when hope has been repeatedly dashed over the years. It’s difficult to look at where she is now and see a way out. It feels overwhelming at times. But God works with the impossible. He is able to break the heavy chains.

And so I need to remember (as does anyone reading this who struggles with a loved one shackled by addiction):

But he (Jesus) said, “What is impossible with man is possible with God.”

Luke 18:37

As long as there is life, there is hope.