Just in the past twenty four hours I have learned so much. I have often forgotten to take a moment of disconnect, rethink it take a moment and breathe. This post is not about making excuses for our sons behavior and his addiction. It is however about putting the pieces of the puzzle together, to understand it better and possibly make treating his addiction a little easier to understand. You see...
Our son Kyle did really good maintaining his sobriety for several years. Because we didn't know what truly happened we started interjecting our own feelings into it and concluded that it had to be his old friends.
About three years ago he relapsed. For a year we have been racking our minds trying to figure out, what happened?
After some recent events with our son and in talking to someone close to him we have learned a few things that in doubt led to this spiraling out of control so fast-so easy.
About three years ago Kyle was working a stable job. He tells me about others on his job that were using pills around him and that he had been so strong in declining any offers. He hurt his back one day on the job. A guy on the job offered him a Perc. At first he declined it, but as the day went on his back was hurting even more and he took the pill.
He said he knew just swallowing it would not have that immediate affect he needed, so he smoked it. Kyle said there was immediate battle going on his head. He felt so guilty for doing it, but it relieved the back pain.
He said this one time use set off a trigger in his brain. He told no one- not the girlfriend- not us- no one. For approximately six months he became what is known as a functioning addict. Then came the layoff. Not enough work to go around and he and his crew were laid off. This would be the event that set in motion the decline and his sobriety spiraling out of control.
He was looking for work, but as we all know having a criminal record doesn't make it easy finding a job. With his back still hurting he found it easy to keep himself self medicated on the streets. He could find what he needed anywhere.
He started lying that he was out looking for work. He said he was embarrassed to tell his then girl friend that he couldn't find anything because of his record. He became too overwhelmed with the pressure that he needed to find a job to help with the household expenses.
He had denied to himself and those around him that he had a problem. That would mean admitting he had slipped.
When he finally admitted what he had been doing-self medicating- it was pretty much too late. He had been using heroin for many months at that time.
His then girl friend would take him to the hospital because at times the pain became so bad he went into seizures.
One look at track marks and it is like "GAME OVER" at the hospital. They did not believe he was in pain and he often was told take Tylenol and sleep it off.
He never in the past years stopped complaining about lower back and abdomen pain. Sometimes the pain was so severe he couldn't walk. Other times the pain so severe he went into seizures.
Last year when he was going to the Martinsburg Institute we know that his medical records were faxed there and was told that he had some really severe medical problems going on. One being his kidneys.
>>>>>>TO BE CONTINUED
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