Those are the words that most friends and families would love to hear from the person in their life who has an addiction problem. Those are the words I should have said 5 years ago. The sad thing is, there was no one who cared enough to implement that kind of help.
I watch the show "Intervention" because it helps remind me of the place I was when we were using, BUT I have to admit I feel a lot of grief to see these people enveloped with all kinds of support- some love- some enabling, but support nevertheless. The kind of friends and family we had were partners in crime as opposed to the stable, loving, providing families I see on the show.
There were some people who went downhill just as bad and fast as we did, some worse. We had parents, siblings, cousins, aunts, uncles, and friends all use with us, but when we started going downhill and some were able to stop, we were only isolated and judged. No one reached out, and the few times I made a dramatic decision to reach out to the police or to someone in Bryson's family, the reactions were detrimental. The police didn't care and the family members blamed us for making things bad for them in the course of them helping us. I won't go into those details because they are too painful.
Even when we hit rock bottom and were in a hotel, staying clean and trying to recover, we were still judged and treated like we were worthless. We didn't even get as bad as some of the people on the show. We never stole from family and despite our addiction, we were always helping the addicts worse off than us.
I am proud of myself to say that we saved ourselves with some help from social services, but I still mourn the type of support that some people have and take for granted. I wish I had a role model that was close by, a parent that I could live with when times are hard, or just go over for dinner. I miss my grandpa, and mom, and my grandma soooo much.
Relapse has crossed my mind more lately than ever, but I know there is no one to save us from ourselves. I think of Uncle P who is going to be in prison for a while because of his relapse. I think of what my kids need in me and to be honest its hard because I miss the super energy I had to do things, but I remember how worthless I was when I was coming down. I remember the Halloween I stayed home because I was dope sick. I remember sleeping for 2 days and nights while my brother watched the kids, and waking up thinking it had only been one night. I remember the kids telling me that they were going to call 911 cause they couldn't wake me. I remember the different police that insulted us and told me that Bryson had the right to commit suicide and made me let him leave. I remember the social worker that I begged to help us with our drug problem, who promised she would come back with a safety plan to get us out of our situation, who instead closed the case and said we could do it on our own. Yeah, we could just quit using an 8 ball of meth and some occasional crack all by ourselves. There are a lot of good memories, but I see that the memories are good because of the actions themselves, not the drugs. I have to keep the consequences close at hand so that I don't relapse.
I am pushing on one day at a time, being my own advocate and my own voice, because there are no voices cheering me on right now besides my inner voice.
