The Darkness of Depression and Dysfunction

My son and I are both going through very difficult times and as it often happens when two people who are very close and are both struggling, they become the worst company for each other. Last week each conversation ended in hurtful words being thrown around and it was as if we wanted to cause each other more pain and suffering because we were hurting! One thing I said to my son, which hurt him profoundly and created such abusive anger in him was the following txt message:  "I have many of my own problems which you seem to disregard. You need to stop making me accountable for everything. I am not responsible for delivering your medication. Your main problem is your addiction which you keep failing to address." There were many txts before and after this particular one, but this one really hit a core with my son.

How dare I call him "an addict" (not my words, but his interpretation)? Not only an addict, but he added "just" as well, "you think I am just an addict", "all my problems are because I am just an addict", etc. Oh the abusive I got for that txt! I hit a nerve, that is for sure. However, I should quietly listen to being called lazy, stupid, crazy, bitch, whore, cunt, pathetic without a reaction. Such is the nature of mother/child relationships? No, definitely not the normal parent/child relationship here! Is it the normal conversation of addict and non addict? Possibly. Once again I think I can say that it IS the way dysfunctional relationships work.

Years of dysfunction and lack of control and lack of support has finally taken it's toll on me. I have almost always been able to cling on to a bit of hope, see something positive and hold on to the belief that the world is essentially a good place. Watching my life slip through my fingers and years stolen from me with nothing to show for it but grief and sadness is not a recipe for positivity. I have said it before that it is difficult for my children to be positive about their lives and their future when they see my life has been a struggle riddled with disappointments, heartache and obstacles.

Ironically however, amidst all the mutual depression wrecking havoc with our lives, that txt message sent in the middle of a txt message war did seem to provide something positive, even if it was fleeting.

A few days later we engaged in a long conversation via e-mail and these are some of my son's insights, which I can not help but wonder if it was a result of the "addiction" comment I made.


         " ... it gave me a new perspective, made me realize what I am doing is just stupid, that I am wasting my life and will be dead if I keep it up, and made me consider what I could do to change it, and reinforced the Ideas I already had (because I had one weak and one strong trip) from earlier  when I just took half, and the issues I had started to work through from the MDMA. "

        "  ..how stupid I have been/being and how I need to change ASAP or I won't have any sort of live whether I 
die or just continue like this."

        "What makes me really sad and ashamed is that, after reading the hospitals leaflet on I.M. (inter muscular injection) Lorazepam (a not so strong  benzo)  that they use to knock people out/sedate them, well, I wouldn't even feel it, and when I I.M. them (I.M.'ing Etizolam is the only thing that helps my back, does fuck all if I don't I.M. It) 

Anyway I am ashamed that what I IM, or just take daily, would have almost anyone knocked out for the duration of its effects. but me, I just get up after shooting 10-15mg (on top of my oral doses) Etizolam, as if I hadn't done anything, apart from a minute or two I feel pretty good (only if I am already real buzzed off just drinking them) or just have it relax my muscles and so help my back a lot.

Other people, what I take in a day, or more accurately, what I CAN take in a day, would have most people dead. Poppy Tea + Promethazine (v. sedating antihistamine that potentiates the opiates and stops me feeling sick on them) + alcohol + benzos + pregabs or Kava Kava, which is a pretty standard day for me, not always with the pregabs/kava, and I don't do the Poppies everyday, I'm trying real hard not to become physically dependant (I bought WAAAY too much)

anyway I bet that would kill 90% of non-tolerant people or just recreational users, and I don't even get much off it and am fine and am never falling asleep or having any signs that I might've had too much, I wake up the next day feeling absolutely fine (after a great nights sleep though!) and do it all over again, just probably with a slightly different combo/

It's disgusting and makes me ashamed of myself (so I take more to forget about that :| )

Thats why, now, I want to go to rehab."

That would be wonderful if my son could hold on to those thoughts, no matter how he eventually got to thinking about them. We continued to talk about the possibility of rehab and also how he would like me to help him find one. It was wonderful, though I knew not to get too excited and put my hopes up too high, it was a very good conversation indeed. My son actually found a ray of light in his darkness. He say the damage he was doing to himself and desired change.  

That conversation and moment of clarity and motivation for positive change took place on Saturday evening; however, by Sunday evening everything had change and my son just wanted to take a lot of drugs and drink vodka until he passed out. All because "friends" on Facebook were "taking the piss" out of him, though he did not want to elaborate. It beat him down and made him feel as he usually does; defeated, deflated, rejected, unliked, unloved, unsuccessful, lonely, pathetic, depressed, worthless and so on. In regard to "fixing" things and moving forward with rehab, well "there are no rehabs that would be accustomed to dealing his type of drug use". Also rehabs would require work, he does not want to do work. The doctors at rehab would take away the useful prescriptions he is on if he would be 100% honest about how he takes his medications as well as other drugs. He thought the only options for him was overdosing or making himself go crazy and going back into the mental hospital. When I tried to say that the mental hospital wont help because when he gets out he will have to adjust to a normal life all over again, he was very quick and very honest in his response, "I do not have a normal life now, I do not know how to live a normal life". Sadly that is very true.

My son is an addict. He is not the proverbial street junkie, but he is an addict. He is not and has never been a "functioning addict". My son does not and never did hold down a job or go to school or maintain friendships while taking drugs. He has never learned the life skills to live in our society. He has, I am ashamed to say, lived a very abnormal life since probably the age of  14 or 15. So at the age of 21 now, after living without friendships or social interactions since he was 16, being homeless twice, having a criminal record, three mental health hospital admissions and a serious drug problem, no he does not live a "normal" life and more importantly, has lived a very unhappy life. A person can live a life that is not considered "normal" or conventional and be very happy, my son has not been happy since he was a very young child. What a very sad realisation for the both of us.

So life goes one, day to day without change, without the knowledge of how to cope daily let along look at long term plans or change. Every now and then I see a flicker of hope in my thoughts, and maybe, just maybe he and I will get more and more flickers of hope until the flicker grows into a bright light fuelling us towards a brighter and indeed happier future because have both been beaten down too many times and we need, no we DESERVE happiness. My daughters need that happiness in their mother's and brother's lives because the cycle continues too much and they also become trapped in the darkness.