Today as we left church I couldn’t help but to smile. Husband was happy. All of our kids were happy. Life was good. When I look back at the path that led me here I can’t help but be amazed. I traded in a cotton filter and a bag of heroin for a life that I had convinced myself was not achievable. Yet here I am. I realized today that when I look back at who I use to be the shame that I have always felt has began to fade. I love who I have become. Not despite my past but because of it.
Some people are able to turn their life around the first time CPS shows up at their doorstep.
Some people get clean after that first overdose.
Others lose a friend or family member and are scared into sobriety.
Every scenario that I just provided has been experienced on more than one occasion. I couldn’t tell you how many CPS cases I have had. How many times I had to fight and prove that I was ready to be a parent. Only to celebrate the case closed with a cocktail of heroin and meth.
Overdose… I remember my first time. Being a type 1 diabetic I remember the paramedics trying to figure out what was wrong with me. I would go in and out of consciousness. I remember trying to fight with the nurses when they were trying to get my shirt off so that they could start an IV but I knew how bruised up that arm was from shooting up so I tried to fight them. That was when I finally shouted HEROIN. This was how I got my first dose of Narcan. After this the doctor comes in and says “Sir, I think your wife just had too much heroin”. Discharge was very quick after that. Once they become aware of your extra curricular activities…you get the boot real fast. I remember standing in the parking lot right after being discharged and shaking from the fear of what just happened and just how easily it happened and saying the words “We have to stop. Never again”. Only to find myself hours later sitting in a bathroom putting a flame to the bottom of the coke can. The hold that heroin had on me was undeniable. It was obvious I was far in over my head. Many years of pain lay in my future. After losing so many people to addiction it will begin to feel as though you are numb. Losing my biological mother and then six months later losing my sister in 2009. These are moments in my life where things began to shift. This is when I found myself at the fork in the road. It is crazy when you think about how so many people are about to make that split decision and sadly so many will make the wrong choice. One decision can change your entire future. Losing my biological mother and then my sister had a profound impact on me. The what if’s that surrounded their deaths was something that I allowed to keep me high for so many years. What if I would have tried to mend that relationship? Why wasn’t I able to offer the same grace that was so overwhelmingly offered to me time and time again? Why? So many questions that I would never have the answer to. The immediate regret of not mending a relationship that you had no idea you wanted. Then you come to terms with the fact that all those years your pain had disguised that “want” as hate. Life is unfair. When it comes to addiction you will never know which cards you have been dealt until the time comes to play the hand. Do you have that recovery card? The life saving hand. Or will you have to fold and become a lesson to someone else. I will never understand how I ended up with the life that I have today. What I did so differently to end up on this side of the deck. The life I live today is beautiful. I have an amazing husband that is my biggest fan. I have some amazing kids that drive me crazy but I wouldn’t change a thing. The key was finding a life that was worth having. For years I couldn’t imagine life without heroin….now I can’t picture life with it. I had to find a life that I enjoyed more than that high that I use to chase. Today that feeling was replaced with pure joy as my bonus daughter raised her hand to accept Jesus as her savior. That high was better than anything I could ever find within the contents of a syringe. The push of a needle finally could not even compare….
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