Father’s Story

You consciously choose the many good memories in these moments to leave them unspoiled; yet is the inevitable anguish of reliving the moments you wished you could change. This led me to an exhaustive assessment of my performance as a parent. As a parent, you try to strike the balance between strictness and grace, provision and preparation. I was blessed to have a job that allowed time for my family and much of it was spent in the everyday routines of life and some just simply having fun. Jake and I shared a love for music as musicians, me a guitar player and Jake with his drums.

We had exposed him to many expressive avenues but he took to the drums and thrived. In fact, so much so, he began creating original music and sharing it with an audience through recording and live shows with his band. A musician playing gigs and still in high school! He was truly living the dream. Despite this I found myself asking the question, “With the time I had, was it well spent?” How much of it was spent preparing him for the inevitable choices he will face in the real world or the responsibilities he must commit to? Was I encouraging independent thought and decisions? Allowing him to fail and recover on his own? Instilling appreciation and gratitude while avoiding a sense of entitlement?

I am not talking here about being present or “there” for them. I am talking about being proactive in their education. And by education I am not referring to writing and arithmetic. I am talking about things you cannot learn in school, like money management, work ethic, loving others and sharing, warning against destructive behaviors such as drug use. We did all of this and yet some were learned and others not.

For example, Jake insisted on making his own money. He never stole, abused the system or borrowed from us to pay for his drug habit. It wouldn’t matter if he had since the result is the same. He prided himself on being a “functional” drug user making the realization of his addiction even more difficult. You cannot shield them from facing the light and dark of this world. Your hope is they will make the right decision when the curiosity arises. Will they turn away from the temptation or will they cross the line into experimentation most likely leading to full blown addiction? You hope as a parent you raised them with enough love and support that they would have the knowledge, self esteem, and self respect to avoid things that would hurt them. In the end, you are not in control. They make their decisions and experience the consequences of those decisions.

As parents, we experienced both the dysfunction of codependency and enabling, as well as, the agony of the decision to break the enabling cycle. When a parent decides to do this, to stop enabling and release them, they know there is that possibility that they will not be there to save them. It is a grueling decision but a necessary one. As a parent who has lost their child to addiction you must learn the difference between the shame and condemnation of guilt and the bitterness of regret. All parents have regrets, mistakes or missed opportunities and we learn from them and it makes us better parents. Guilt comes from a sense of responsibility for another’s choices. That somehow you had the control to change the outcome. It can eat away at you leading you to dark places filled with despair and anger. This allows the drug that killed your child to beat you as well. You may have never touched the drug however it is beating you all the same. It may not kill you but it will take you to a place where you are no longer a participant in life and the drug has therefore claimed another victim. Free yourself!