I am not your friend. I’m your mother, and I’ve changed. I don’t belong to me anymore. I don’t care about me. Not in the way I used too. I care about you. I WANT you. I will do ANYTHING for you. I LOVE you. I NEED you…
And I will step over anyone who gets in my way.
When I look at you, I don’t see YOU. I see my little boy.
You have no money. I do. End of story. I don’t care if I can’t pay the rent. I don’t care if I need groceries. I don’t care if I promised I wouldn’t give you money again. I don’t care if I lie to Dad. I don’t care if I’m broke. I’ll sell my rings, take a loan, sell my electronics, max out my credit cards, or borrow the money from someone else.
I WILL find a way to help.
I think I can CHANGE you, or SAVE you. Am I WRONG?
Something cold and dead slithers within me. I CRY all the time. You don’t care. You have no integrity or values. My morals are a thing of the past.
I’ll say anything, do anything, and hurt anyone, to help you feel better.
Although I may play the game with you, make no mistake. I don’t play it because I want to. I play it because I NEED to PLEASE you. I’ll do whatever you want, I will promise you the world, I’ll look you in the eyes, and YOU will break my heart, over and over again. You don’t have a heart any more. You have a HUNGER. It’s calculating and manipulative, and it OWNS me.
In a strange way I’m thankful for this hunger. For when you need something, you find me, quick! Then when you’ve gotten what you want, you leave.
I’m anxious without you. I offer to buy your food, or pay your rent. I always GIVE you something.
By now, my NEED is almost as great as yours.
You can’t stay SICK without me. I can’t breathe without YOU.
I think I’m helping you. I believe I’m making a difference, but what I’m really helping…
is your ADDICTION.
You won’t tell me this, but I know it, deep down.
If we keep going like this, one or both of us will die. You from an overdose that I paid for, and me from a heart attack, or stroke.
I’ve waited YEARS for you to change, or see the light.
I keep your secrets and protect your lies. I clean up your messes and bail you out. I love you to the exclusion of EVERYONE else.
I’ve become bitter and resentful. I hide from my friends and isolate. I HATE.
My world revolves around one thing only… YOU!
Will my LOVE ever become greater than my FEAR? Will I be strong enough to reach out for help? Will I learn to say NO? Will I allow you to experience the consequences of your actions? Will I LOVE you enough to feel my GUILT and stop enabling your ADDICTION?
I lay trapped within the confines of this cold dark, codependent – addiction, and I am … DYING.

Lorelie Rozzano
www.jaggedlittleedges.com
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Lorelie-Rozzano/506483446066023

(c) 2014 Jagged Little Edges All Rights Reserved

8 comments

  1. Chris

    So how do we as mothers of addicts reclaim our lives

  2. Michelle

    Wow, this was dead on. Being the mother of an addict consumes you. There is never a moment of the day or night that you are not wondering when…when will it take her. It is so hard to sit back and watch your baby suffer and not try to make it better, to hear the way others judge. You want to take their pain away. You want to understand what you did wrong. This was written perfectly. I never went as far as this Mom with the money but still lost everything just the same. I believe the family suffers more.. They don’t have luxury of dulling the pain away.

  3. So powerful and so true. As the mother of an addict I’ve struggled with the same feelings that I have to enable to keep him alive long enough to get well again. I know some of the things I do truly do help him to advance on the road to recovery, and other things probably help him to continue avoiding that road, and other things make not difference whatsoever. I’m beginning to learn how to let go and let God, as they say. To understand it’s his life, not mine to live. To back away while keeping the unconditional love in place. But I still see myself as a safety net. I keep waiting, arms held wide, to catch him should he fall too far, or to blunt his landing with my body. I still do, even while I try to stand aside. Try to let my love and trust be greater than my fear and guilt.

  4. Thanks Robert and AnnaRoseMeeds. I’m not playing by the rules when it comes to addiction any more. This illness trains us to enable and to feel sick when saying no. Families often live with more misery than the addict does. I won’t stay silent. I’m telling anyone who will listen the real truth behind this disease and how to reclaim your life. Thanks for responding!

  5. My friend Lorelie, I also have traveled down this very path with someone I still love. She is gone for now because she knows the very same steps that you mention in your post here is so true with many families and love ones on this journey. God bless you and thank you for sharing this does help, peace 🙂

  6. Wow, this was so powerful. I am sorry that you feel stuck in such a position.

    • Thanks for your concern. I don’t feel stuck now, but I have in the past. This is one of a 4 part series, on the families role when it comes to loving an addict. The other three show the addicts perspective, the daughters perspective and the wife’s perspective. Addiction really is a game the whole family can play!

      • I have seen that so much in my own family. Way to go moving out of that place. This post is brilliant.

Comments are closed.