I sit here at 5am on Sunday, wondering where you are, which of your associates you’re with (I call them that as your real friends gave up on you long ago, after you let them down, ripped them off, and sold them dodgy drugs once too often) and whether you’ll be back in time for today’s family gathering. It’s doubtful that you’ll make it, and once again I’ll have to explain that you’re not feeling well and that’s why you can’t get out of bed to join us.
Are you safe out there or are you taking enormous risks on a drug-induced high? Will I get a call to say that you have been found unconscious, or worse, after an overdose or attacked? Are the police going to call to say you’ve been caught with stashes of coke, MDMA or Valium and you’re waiting to be charged? Have you persuaded your long-suffering girlfriend, with her misplaced loyalty, who turns a blind eye to the dealing and says she is there to protect you, to go with you?
You suffer from chronic under-confidence, bouts of depression that cause you to sleep for days, drug-induced paranoid attacks when you believe that you’re being eaten by bed bugs, fleas and dust mites and you scratch your skin to pieces. Worse are the high periods when you’re up for days on end talking nonstop nonsense, telling me about the mate who’s going to get you a job in the City for £100 an hour, or another one who’s going to set you up in a catering business selling steak sandwiches to people coming out of the clubs in the morning. When you’re like this you can do anything and the world is your oyster – but the plans don’t materialise and you haven’t worked for two years.
You say you’re fine, that everyone takes a bit of coke and ecstasy, and smokes weed now and again. “Stop stressing me out,” you say when I beg you to get help for your addictions. Your GP can’t help as you don’t admit to him that you have a problem. There seems to be any amount of help and advice out there for drug users and their families, but you refuse to engage and I feel too hopeless to continue trying on my own.
What did we do wrong to turn you from a beautiful, bright, funny boy into this person I can’t recognise and whom, quite honestly, I’ve come to dislike intensely and often feel scared of. Oh yes, the worst symptoms are the unpredictability of your moods, the aggression leading to our fear of violence.
Your younger brother has moved out now after suffering years of your erratic behaviour. He learned how to keep out of your way long ago but, strangely, now fiercely defends you and tells us to give you some space. I would love to say I can see a positive future for us all together but while you reject our attempts to try to help you, it’s impossible for us to carry on living like this.
We’ve made a decision after months of soul-searching and the time has come to send you out to make your own way. You’ll be moving out next weekend, even if you have nowhere to go. I hope one day you’ll understand that we’re heartbroken. We love you and if I could have one wish it would be that you’ll be well and happy.
My lovely son, please get better, forgive us and come back to us.
Mum
