My Mom's Tale: If Things Were Different

Have you ever taken a tragedy of your life and daydreamed about how it could have been different? I'm about to do just that because these are the "what ifs" that lurk in my thoughts and inject me with the venom of guilt. These are the thoughts that keep me up at night. What could I have done differently that day?

Welcome to my mental wonderland. Welcome to my Matrix.

The one in which my Mom is alive.

For seventeen years I witnessed my mom drowning in the sea of addiction. And what a deep-sea it was. For seventeen years I fought. I fought with myself. I fought with her. I fought with God. I wanted to fight the whole world. Seventeen years of agony that has led up to this moment.

I called my mom almost every day. Today on May 21st, 2021, she wouldn't pick up the phone. I thought to myself, "Maybe she's gone to town" but something felt off today. Do you know how people talk about that "gut feeling"? It's true. There was an emptiness in my stomach that I couldn't push away.

I told my husband, Randell, "She's not answering the phone. I have a bad feeling."

My husband replied, "It's probably just your anxiety talking. You know how your mom is. She probably just went to one of her friend's houses. I'm sure she's fine."

"Babe," I said. "I'm really worried, lets just go by her house and check on her. You know how she neglects her health and never goes to the doctor. She could suddenly just drop."

"Okay. If it'll make you feel better we'll go check on her." He replied.

We got in the vehicle and drove to her house and the entire time it felt like the pit in my stomach was growing. It felt like my anxiety was trying to consume me for good. I looked over at my husband. "When we get there, I want you to go in. If I was to find her dead, It would break me mentally. Possibly to the point of no return. You've seen death before when Ashley (His first wife) passed away. You would be able to handle it."

He agreed.

We pulled up in her driveway and the disgusting taste of stomach acid filled my mouth. My head was reeling. In my mind, I envisioned her dead and sprawled out on the floor. My mind was doing what it always did. Conjuring the worst.

My husband got out of the car and walked up to her door and knocked. No answer. He knocked and waited a couple of minutes before finally turning the doorknob. Her door was unlocked. He walked inside and after a couple of minutes, he walked out and walked over to me.

"She's alive. She's just messed up on pills."

Seventeen years of anger came flooding my soul once again. I hated it when she was messed up. I didn't want to look at her. I didn't want to even talk to her. Her slurred words and empty eyes infuriated me. I stepped out of the car and went inside.

When I stepped into her house, she was sitting on the couch, slumped over. She didn't even acknowledge my presence. There were bags of groceries on the floor. Several of them were refrigerated items that had been sitting there for several hours. Still cool to the touch but barely. There was even a tub of ice cream that was completely melted. I put everything up for her and then I walked over to her.

"Mom" She merely grunted.

"Mom, when did you go to town?" Another grunt and a slurred word "Yesterday"

She didn't even know when she had gone grocery shopping which had clearly been that morning. She was so out of it.

"Mom, who were you with?" I asked because I had every intention of calling the person on her cellphone and interrogating them and if they confessed to giving her pills, I was going to scream at them.

Once again, she grunted.

That gut feeling I spoke of earlier? It was no longer an empty feeling. It was a loud voice screaming at me. "CALL 911!!" It screamed. The anger within screamed back. "WHY?! WHY SHOULD I?! IT’S USELESS!! SHE'LL JUST MANAGE TO GET OUT THE WORDS "I don't want to go" AND THEN THE PARAMEDICS CAN'T TAKE HER AGAINST HER WILL REGARDLESS OF HOW SLURRED THOSE WORDS ARE!"

It was suddenly a screaming match within me. "CALL 911!!" The voice of my gut feeling said again. My anger screamed once again "WE'VE BEEN THERE AND DONE THAT! IT NEVER WORKS! Let's just leave and she'll call tomorrow and act like it never happened."

I got up and I turned my back. All I wanted to do was leave. The war within me was giving me a headache. I walked over to the door and put my hand on the doorknob and I froze. I knew at that moment if I didn't at least try, I would live the rest of my days drowning in guilt if something happened to her. I knew it was probably pointless but no matter how angry I felt, I had to try.

I walked out to the car and told my husband to call 911. I walked over to her front steps and waited for what felt like an eternity. I had been here before. When I was around fifteen years old when she overdosed like this the first time and had to be taken to the hospital, have her stomach pumped, sent to rehab for three weeks, only to get out and go back to her true love. The orange bottle.

Here I was at thirty years old. I felt like that fifteen-year-old kid again. Scared. Angry. Hurt. Why did she always do this? Was I not enough? I could understand not being enough. My mom's other daughter, nineteen years older than me, was a perfect daughter.

She got good grades. She graduated. She got out of this hellhole state and moved off to Florida shortly after graduating. She went to college, had a career, managed money well, and did so much with her life. And here I was.

A disappointment living in the shadow of my sister. Bad grades, a Highschool dropout, no career, two kids, the only goal in life was finding prince charming, which I at least accomplished that. Here I am at 30 years old and still have no clue what I want to do with my life. So yeah, I could see that I wasn't worth staying sober for.

But what about her beautiful grandbabies? Weren't they enough?

I was torn away from my thoughts of self-loathing as the paramedics pulled up. I opened the door for them and began to explain to them about my mom's addiction.

They walked over to her and began to ask her the standard questions. " What's your name?", "Do you know where you are?", "What year is it?", etc.

All she could really do is grunt. They brought in the stretcher and got her loaded up into the ambulance. We followed them to the hospital, went inside, and waited.

Once again I was lost in my thoughts and feeling so much. Finally, after about an hour the Doctor showed up to speak to us.

Before he could even get a word out, I asked "Is my mom okay?"

" Yes, she's stable. We pumped her stomach and are currently giving her fluids. She's lucky to be alive. If you had not found her, she would have been dead. She had a lethal cocktail of opioids, benzodiazepines, as well as a muscle relaxers in her system."

Hearing the Doctor speak only fueled my anger. I explained to him how I've been dealing with her addiction for years and her overdosing when I was 15 and saving her life then as well. I told him about her suicidal ideation too.

He replied, " I see. I'm sorry for everything you have been through. This must be really hard for you... We're going to keep her in the hospital for a couple of days and then we'll send her to a behavioral hospital for three weeks."

I knew it was pointless. I knew what would happen. she'd just relapse again. And eventually, within the next few years, we'd do this again. But I didn't tell the doctor that. I didn't tell him that it would be a waste of time to send her to the behavioral hospital. I simply nodded and said, "Sounds good to me... Is it okay If I see her?"

"You can but she's not conscious right now," he replied.

I and my husband got up and walked into her room. There she was. Hooked up to a ventilator. She looked peaceful. I walked over to her and held her hand. Even though I know she was completely out of it and wouldn't hear a word I said, I spoke anyways.

"Mom, Why do you have to do this? You've hurt me so much these past 17 years. You keep hurting me. I know you've had so much trauma in your life but why can't you just go get counseling like other people? I'm so angry right now and I want to hate you, but I can't bring myself to do it. Despite you hurting me over and over again, I still love you...Any other person probably would have left you 17 years ago and ran away from home. But I'm still here. And every time you hurt me, I always come back despite the fact I swear I won't.....I just want my old mom back. The one who used to make my childhood magical. The one who took me on adventures and played barbies with me. You were the best mom. All I want is for you to come back to me. Please... I need my mom. My old mom. I just don't know who are you anymore and I don't know how to help you when you don't want help. I'm so tired of this war between us...I'm gonna go home now mom. Maybe tomorrow when I come to see you, I won't be so angry...I love you."

I kissed her forehead and we left.

The next day we went to visit her again. She was awake and responsive and off the ventilator.

"Hey, mom."

She looked at me. She still looked so weak.

"Where’re those babies at?" she asked.

"Beau and Piper are with their pawpaw. Mom, why did you take so many pills again?"

She started crying. "I don't want to be here in this hospital. I want out"

"Sorry mom, but they have to keep you and they're sending you to a behavioral hospital for three weeks just like they did before. You don't have a choice."

"You shouldn't have called 911. You have just left me there. You know I hate hospitals." She said.

"Mom they said If I hadn't called you would have died"

She spoke through her tears "So? No one cares about me. It wouldn't have mattered"

"Oh, so your grandchildren don't matter?! If you won't live for me you could at least live for them! Do they mean nothing to you!? I hate it when you do this! You sit there and you do nothing but make people feel sorry for you! I've been dealing with this for seventeen years! Since I was a child! I know I was a teenager but that’s still a child! No child should have to pick their intoxicated mother off the floor and clean up food after her because she can't even stay awake long enough to eat! Are you happy about those things?! Are you proud of being a freaking pill addict?!"

She got angry and did what she ALWAYS did. Turned the blame on me and everyone else. And as always, the words stung. If I had been a better daughter. If I had made her proud. Would it have stopped her from ever using?

"You always do this mom. It's never your fault. You always blame everyone else for your problems instead of taking responsibility for your own actions. I'm tired of it and I won't listen to it anymore. I'm leaving. I guess I'll see you in a few weeks."

I walked out fuming and hurt.

Over the next few weeks, while my mom was in rehab, my husband was researching mental illness for a youtube video. I had asked him to because I suffer from ADHD and anxiety and I figured researching would help him better understand me. During his research, He discovered something that changed everything about the war between me and my mom.

Addiction is a mental illness known as Substance Use Disorder. My mom's addiction is not her fault.

With this new-to-me information, I initially felt angry and betrayed by life. Why didn't I learn this sooner? It could have possibly changed everything. My anger and condemnation only fueled her addiction. What if I had been compassionate and understanding? Perhaps it would have helped her heal. At that moment I knew what I had to do.

We took a trip to the behavioral hospital. It was over an hour away. The entire time I stared out the window wondering what I was going to say and how the conversation would go. Was I too late to show compassion and understanding and forgiveness? Would it do any good? I prayed for a miracle. Often talking to my mom felt no different than talking to a brick wall. She was so stubborn.

When we finally reached the behavioral hospital, I was a ball of nerves. I had gotten so used to being angry and resentful. Everything felt so complicated. I was about to humble myself to someone who I felt like I both loved and hated. For seventeen years she felt like both an ally and an enemy.

We walked in and told the receptionist who we were there to see. We signed in and were given visitor passes and then led to a large mostly empty room. A few minutes later they brought my mom in, in a wheelchair. She looked so depressed.

Right away she started talking about how she didn't want to be there.

I walked over to her, kneeled in front of her, and threw my arms around her, and broke down.

"I'm so sorry mom. I'm so sorry for everything these past seventeen years. While you've been here, Randell was researching mental illness and discovered addiction is a mental illness. I learned so much. I learned you didn't choose this and you truly don't want this but you don't know how to escape. I know now that it’s not easy for you to just stop. I understand everything now and I'm so sorry I didn't understand sooner. I'm no longer angry at you and I hope you forgive me for my ignorance. I will never be angry at you again and I promise from now on I won’t judge you or criticize you. You have my hand and my ear if you need it. I will stay by your side on this journey no matter how hard it is... I still love you and all I want now is to help you heal."

What I said made an impact. I finally broke through her emotional walls. She hugged me back and broke down in my arms and I held her as she wept. She wept as though she had been waiting for those words from my lips for seventeen years.

The next couple of years were hard. She agreed to get counseling. She started doing the things she loved again. She relapsed a few times but every time she got back up and tried again. I watched her fight harder than ever. I watched my old mom slowly start coming back to life. She watched her Grandson graduate high school and go to college and get married and give her a beautiful great-grandson. She got to play barbies with her granddaughter just like she did with me when I was little. She watched her reach her sweet sixteen and then graduate high school as well. She stayed sober for 23 years and lived a peaceful life. All because I showed compassion to her at her lowest point in life.

At 93 she laid in her bed with us by her side as she was clinging to life. It was time. I held her hand and sang "Amazing Grace to her" She stared at my face and managed a weak smile.

After I got done singing, I leaned down and whispered into her ear, "Mom, I'm so proud of you. I love you and you're free to go to your Heavenly home. Go. Go to your brothers. Go to your Momma and your Mawmaw. Go to dad. I will miss you but we'll be okay, I promise. I'm letting you go...But I'll see you again."

Her eyes met mine and then she nodded and took her last breath.

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The Non-fiction version of this story can be found here. But I warn you, It has no happy ending.

I told this fictional alternate-universe type story to demonstrate what could have happened had I shown compassion and mercy and understanding. Addiction is so misunderstood and more often than not, is not treated fairly. People who suffer from it get treated with harsh judgment and condemnation. Who knows how many people would still be alive if they had been shown mercy and compassion.

I implore everyone who reads my articles to research substance use disorder. The more we understand, the more we can help others heal and save their lives.

To learn more, please visit my husband's Facebook page.

It's true what they say. Knowledge is power.

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To My Mom:

If I would have had that power, perhaps this story would be non-fiction. I love you and I miss you every day and I hope that maybe in an alternate universe, this story is a reality for you. See you again mom...