Grief Graffiti

 Whenever that Mom-Guilt starts creeping back in I have to remind myself that I did my best, that he knew he was loved & supported, that he was never completely alone. Once your child is gone you will always wish you had done more, spent more time with them, given them more. But then I think about so many of his friends that didn’t have their mother’s support, and who often turned to me for love & comfort. No child, no matter what choices they made in life, should feel unloved by their mother. Addicts especially, as they experience some of the worst self-hatred & suicidal ideations. I’ve seen first hand how love & connection can heal & change people. In the end, once they’re gone, you only regret the love you didn’t give.

It’s amazing how many of us are members of this “club” that no one wants to belong to. Everyone in our club has lost a child to addiction. Some have lost more than one. But not everyone who has lost a child to addiction is a member of the club. If you are here, feel proud of yourself. You are grieving over your lost child. You did your best to save your child. You felt their pain when they lived, and you grieve their absence now. Your child’s death tore apart your life, and you came here seeking support and comfort from other parents who feel the same.

This isn’t true of all parents. Many parents gave up, were too busy with their own lives or their own drug use, or just didn’t give a damn. Somehow their child’s addiction and eventual death left little or no impression on them. Unbelievable to us, but nonetheless true. Trust me, I know. I knew the children of many of those parents. They slept on my couch, ate my food, wore my son’s clothes and smoked my son’s cigarettes. Sometimes they lived on the street. At other times, they jumped from one friend’s house to another. A few of them found abandoned houses that they called home. I gave up long ago asking them if they wanted to call home to let their parents know where they were and that they were OK. They never did. What was the point, they asked. No one cared. Some of them even seemed surprised that I thought someone would. It broke my heart.

My son always called me. He knew damn well how much I cared and worried. I will never understand those parents. We won’t meet them here. After all, if there was a problem, it was their kids’ own fault. If they hung out with the wrong crowd or made wrong decisions, that was on them. Those parents won’t bother feeling guilty. They’ll never experience the ‘what ifs’ or ‘should haves’ or ‘whys’. They’ll never feel like they failed their children because they never really tried to save them. Those parents don’t feel the need to join the club, because this club is only for parents who cared.

It’s true that we are parents who lost a child to addiction. It’s true that we could not save them. But we are the good parents. We are the ones who tried. Our children are the ones who were loved despite their problems. Our children knew what it was like to be supported and fought for. Our children were the lucky ones. They had us.

~Susan Sek, “Welcome to the Tribe”