Addiction

I made my way to the local Wally World today for my bi-weekly shopping excursion. I dodged fellow shoppers, quickly made my selections and rushed to the check out. I have a love hate relationship with Wally World but I digress.

.

I looked for and was happy to find my Aunt. I don't get to see her often and take every hellish Wally world visit to catch up if she is working that day. She asked the usual, how are the kids, school, etc.

.

When I inquired about her life she took a deep breath and informed me that my uncle isn't doing so well. He is still unemployed but finally received medicaid so he can begin seeking help for his "sickness".

.

Since neither he or his wife have gainful employment and are raising my 6 year old cousin, my aunt picked up extra shifts in an effort to help them out financially. The problem is Hell-Mart is her second job for supplemental income so she doesn't really have the money either. So, she explained, "your Mom, Dad, Grandpa and Ma have been chipping in to help them out, it's very stressful for everyone right now. We are all so worried about him."

.

I listened to her talk about the toll this is taking on everyone, how worried they all are, how upset it is making my family. Then I asked about his wife and what she was doing as their son is in school and she wasn't working the last time I heard.

.

"Oh well, she's...you know...her! but the one thing that just pisses me off! Her family hasn't lifted ONE finger to help! Not one!" As she spoke her face turned red and her voice lifted. She became so agitated she told me she had to go and gave a fast hug before walking away.

.

I watched her go and the same thing repeated over and over in my mind. "Why would they want to help him?"

.

This "sickness" my Aunt so cleverly tries to disguise as something else is in fact drug addiction. My Uncle has been actively doing drugs, all sorts of them, for years. He has been in and out of rehab for addiction to narcotics, alcohol, cocaine, you name it. My family always kept his arrests and mistakes "hush hush". He would promise to get sober, they would band together to pool money to pay his fines and things would go back to normal. No one ever discussed the huge elephant sitting in the room.

.

Unfortunately, my family can no longer hide behind the facade that everything is ok. This time my uncle is addicted to a drug that is merciless and takes people down hard and fast. He is addicted to the drug spreading itself across our nation. A drug that takes piece by piece of you until there is nothing left. This drug I refer to is called crystal meth.

.

When I saw him this past Christmas I had a pretty good guess as to his drug of choice that holiday season. He was missing more teeth (years of abuse had taken a few of them), his skin was patchy and yellow and he had dropped a massive amount of weight. At 6"4' he weighed less than I do. He looked like death. I asked my Aunt (when he was well out of ear shot), "what's wrong with Uncle?? he's so freaking skinny!" and was told, "oh! he was diagnosed with diabetes and it's made him so sick! but he's getting better and has found a great doctor!".

.
I can't tell you why she said that. I assume she imagined I was still a child and would take everything told to me at face value. I nodded and walked away. Since then things have steadily went downhill fast for him and consequently, his wife and son. Meth doesn't take long to manifest itself in your everyday life after it's teeth have settled in, or at least that's what I've been told.
.
I watched my Aunt walk away today and felt a mixture of emotions but one stood out among them. Anger. I'm so angry at this person and his addictions over the years. I'm angry that my Mom and Dad, Aunt and Grandparents have to suffer and stress over this year after year. But at the same time that anger leads to frustration. Frustration that my family won't cut him off and make him stand on his own two feet. Frustrated that this has been allowed to go on for so long and probably won't end until his addictions kill him. And I'm sad. Sad that a 6 year old little boy won't ever know what it means to have a real father, just one that sits around high in his presence.
.
It's heartbreaking.

Violence

It was hot and humid that day. I hurried out of the office to meet Jimbo for lunch. Usually we packed our lunches but we'd had a long week and needed a break from it all and nothing seemed better at that time than a shared meal consisting of a greasy quarter pounder with fries.

I pulled into the parking lot and he was waiting for me. We walked in together, ordered and took our seats. I can't recall exactly what it was we talked about but I'm sure it had something to do with plans for our future (we were not yet married) and that conversation led to us being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

A nice jewelry store was located in a building directly next door. We had some time left before we had to return to work and decided to go in and take a look at their wedding rings. We were ushered to the very expensive section with platinum and diamonds but quickly made our way to the rings more within our price range. As we were leaving, one of the women handed me a brochure for the diamonds they are licensed to sell. These diamonds are special because of the cut that illuminates each individual ray of light that touches it.

I was scanning the inside of the booklet and didn't notice the man walking inside. I just saw a shadow really and as force of habit made my way to move so he or she could pass by. I looked up when that little instinct we all have took over to let me know he was still directly in my path.

I cannot tell you what the gun looked like, or what kind of gun it was, or if it was even big or small. From the moment I saw it pointed at me, nothing computed. I just simply stopped and stared down the barrel while dozens of thoughts ran through my mind. The moment was beyond surreal.

The man had a bandanna tied around the bottom half of his face and a cap on his head. The only feature I could see were his eyes and I made sure not to look into them. I'm not sure why but I just knew somehow he might feel threatened and begin shooting us all. He motioned all of the people in the room into a group. I huddled behind Jim, terrified and kept thinking "wake up!!!" as if I were locked in some god awful nightmare.

"If any of you move I'll kill you, I swear to god!!" He repeated this over and over again. I began to shake violently and I felt a wave of regret that I wouldn't be able to tell my family, my Mom, Sister, Father or Niece that I love them. I wondered if my niece, then 1, would even remember me.

The man quickly went through the glass cabinets and displays, yanking gold chains and jewelry out and shoving them into the bag being held by one of the women that worked there. The entire robbery took place in under 3 minutes but it felt like an eternity.

When he was done, he fled quickly through the doors all the while still threatening , "if you call the cops I'll come back here and kill you all, I swear to god!" and ran out the door into the hot midday sun. We all stood in shock until one of the staff ran and locked the glass doors and hit the panic button. I collapsed to the ground and began to shake and cry. I finally stopped when the police arrived.

This happened to me several years ago. My carefree days of walking into a store, or any pubic place, was forever changed in those 3 minutes. The first few months I was terrified to go anywhere on that particular busy street again. I attempted to go to that came McD's a few months later in an effort to "get over it" and had to leave with food in hand. I've never eaten there again.

It's so sad and so wrong when violence touches so many, even those just trying to do their job and live their lives. I should also mention that, while I didn't know it at the time, I was pregnant with our first child.

Thanks ernursey. for sharing your story. I'm glad that you stood up for what you believed in and took a stand. We never did find the person that committed that crime but I like to think that eventually his lifestyle caught up to him. The police believed it was a "crack head" looking for a "fix".

Jimbo and I moved into a house in the country shortly after and a stay at home Mom was born.

Scorpions

Just like the title says. I can't stand them, they look nasty and repulse me.

Today I found one in our house and being the mature mother I am I screamed and jumped around wildly before swatting it to death with the broom. (which is no easy task, those suckers simply don't want to die)

My skin will crawl and I will feel "bugs" on me for the rest of the day. Fan-tas-tic!

The "Sign"

Well, it's not exactly what I had in mind but if it slows people down that's all that matters.

I have to hand it to them, the department of transportation in my county might not know alot about speed tables but they get signs up quickly.

Update: Road Rage Driver

I've spent the better part of my morning being directed from one person to another in an attempt to have a speed bump, excuse me *cough* I mean, a speed table, placed on our short residential road. (I was informed they no longer call them "speed bumps" yet he couldn't say exactly why when I inquired)

After playing phone tag I got in contact with the person in charge. Unfortunately, the person in charge is somewhat confused on the procedure and policy concerning placing a speed table on our street. It seems they no longer are allowed to do that and since it's state property, I cannot pay and have it done myself. So what's a Mom to do to prevent the idiotic people around her from driving like loons and putting her children (and her neighbor's children too I might add) in danger?

Well, it seems that Logan's autism warrants a "handicap children area" sign in front of our house. They will be coming this week or the beginning of next week to place it. When I asked exactly what a handicap sign looks like he said he wasn't sure but "it has something about deaf children on it".

While I am very concerned that our state representitives don't know what they will be sending their crew out to place in front of my house, I'm at least relieved that Mrs. Bimbo speed freak (and the teenagers that live in the house next to her) will see they need to slow it down.

Oh and if that doesn't work, I've got permission to contact the sheriff's deputy for a "stake-out" at the ponderosa to catch us some speeders. I wonder if he likes donuts or pancakes?

.

**for clarification on exactly what I'm talking about, please see my Eating Hearts blog two posts down.

Mom confession of the Week

I love to smell my children. I'm like some strange wildlife creature. Annabel has taken Vincent's place now, as the youngest. I smell her feet, toes, belly, neck and my personal favorite, top of her head.

My husband thinks I've lost it.

Eating your Heart

Today was a pretty bad start as mornings go. Annabel woke me at 4am to nurse and didn't finish until about 5am. I put her back to sleep and rolled over to attempt to get in one hour before I had to get up to get the kids going for school.

At 5:30am, I hear Logan come from his room. He climbs into the bed with us and I pray he will sleep at least the next 30 minutes. Sadly, as is the case most of the time, he didn't want to sleep any longer and his father and I slopped out of the bed. The rest of our family woke before 7am (all but Annabel who is very wisely sleeping while she can, it isn't something easily done in this house) and we got Arwen and Logan ready for school. I took Vincent downstairs, cut on some cartoons to tide him over while I took Logan outside for the bus and we bid farewell to Daddy and Arwen as they made their way to work and school.

Then something happened I have feared since the moment I had Arwen. We were waving goodbye and suddenly, as our car took off down the road, Logan took off running to it. I was several feet behind him and started off after him (at a fast walk, since he was not at the road and we live in a residential neighborhood in the boonies with only 12 houses). As Jimbo pulled off I hear a car...and it's not his. I look as Logan is running toward the street and see the neighbor that flies down the street in her SUV barreling down the road.

I begin to scream at the top of my lungs and a gurgled "LOGAN STOP!" tries to fly out of my lips but my chest cold and sinus infected lungs won't work properly. I'm running as I'm screaming and time seems to stop but not the car and not my son. My heart sinks and I see an image in my head of my son being struck down by that car and his smiling face being gone from my life.

At the last moment, before Logan actually reached the road, my voice worked, "LOGAN STOP NOW!!". He stopped and stood laughing, as if it were a game and I was terrified he would continue running because of it. Then he saw the car (which was almost upon him) and watched it sail (FLY by, she and I are going to have a talk this afternoon, I'm going to see her and let her know there are children that live on our block. If that doesn't work I'm calling the county roadway director about getting a speed bump in front of my home) on by.

In retrospect, I should have done several things. I should never have let him walk away from me without holding my hand (we have a very large front yard he plays in usually whlie awaiting the bus) however and as I said, live in the country in a tiny subdivision, our road ends with a cul de sac. I should have pulled him down to my level to try and convey just how dangerous running toward the road is. But in the end, my son is autistic and he wouldn't have absorbed just how upset I was over his actions.

I ate my heart this morning. I haven't done that since Arwen turned blue and was rushed to the ER with RSV at 2 weeks old. It is something I won't forget and will mold the future of how I walk my son to greet the bus.

It occurred to me that when you need to scream, or run, or react, everything seems to freeze. It's as if time stops so you can absorb every detail of what is about to happen. I never want to experience that again. I'm hoping the lady down the road won't either when I'm finished dealing with her.