On 9/11, they lost their son (25 years old). He was on the job for one week and he was a painter on the roof of one of the towers.

Before they found remains, I went to the first memorial at our local church. The whole neighborhood showed up and they had his photo blown up on the church altar. That was the saddest thing I ever saw.

Then, when they found some of the remains, she had a funeral (with closed coffin). That was about 6 months after the memorial.

I was with her for the whole thing. She explained how they called her up and she went down and they had photos to show her. The lady who had the photos begged her not to look. I said "did you look"? and she said" "No".

The lady who showed her the photos broke down.

As she was telling me this on the corner of my block, I broke down because who on earth can listen to what this woman went through and not break down?

They all had substance abuse problems before 9/11.

It only got worse after that day.

How sad.

Mel

That is so sad. I remember them talking about the workers who were on the building when it happened. My heart goes out to them.

I hope that someday they remember their son sober and take notice that he would want them to get clean and live life by honoring him. Right now their heartbreak is ruling their lives.

All of us have to wrestle with loss. Eventually we have to find a "comfortable" place to put it in our hearts and minds so we can move on. For everyone it's difficult and some never do. I know it took me years to do that and during that time it did run my life. It's still there but has settled down now. It took a really long time though. Time does help. They are just memories now, not PAINFUL ones.

Interestingly enough, I was coming home from shopping (about 1 hour ago), and I have to pass their house. The husband comes our of the house, straight as a ramrod, (no sign of drinking, but I know this doesn't mean ANYTHING).

I see the keys in his hands and my heart sinks. I think "oh no, he's going to take off", but he got in his car and he backed his car into his driveway and went into the house.

I gather sometimes he's functional and sometimes he's not functional whatsoever.

Another thing, I already posted a thread on these forum, titled 'Trying to help a friend".

She's been drinking because her son drinks. I know, doesn't make sense but it makes sense TO HER.

Well she was sober and clean for 5 days. She was taking it one day at a time.

Last night she calls me, and she sounded just fine, when all of a sudden she goes into a spiel about the Catholic Church and kids and pedophiles, and everybody sucks, and she's going on and on, and it hit me and I said "what happened to the clean and sober for 5 days?" and she said: "yeah, I drank today". I said 'how come?" and she said:

"FEAR"!!

I said "what are you afraid of?" and she said: "That my son is going back to drinking, I mean, he doesn't drink in the house but what do I know what he does when he goes out".

I said "you can only concern yourself with what you do, you have no power over his behavior". I then said 'what made you take the first drink after 5 days of not drinking".

And she said: 'oh, I came home work and said "what the hell, I deserve this"

I said: 'that's one of the things that alcoholics say to rationalize their drinking".

She said "Oh I know this".

So I guess she's back to square one. After 5 days.

Really hard isn't it???

mel

Very hard. I don't even remember how many times I stopped only to start again a couple of days later. Sometimes it would be days, a couple of weeks, then once I got as far as four months and fell hard.

Not too many quit on the first try.

Christina:

Thanks for all the good info.

I know there's going to come a time when she calls me up, ranting and raving saying stuff like "you think you're so perfect because you lost 100 lbs", and a lot of other hateful spoutings, because I know that when a person is deep in an addiction and can't stop (for whatever reason), well they turn on their family and friends.

She has already been ranting at her husband. He rants at her. Amazingly, the only person she seems to have unconditional love for is the 30 year old alcoholic son.

I for one, DO NOT UNDERSTAND how he is not made to be accountable for his behavior. Not only is his drinking the cause of much of the distress, but when he began calling me (after being released from the hospital, and he was detoxed, and clean and sober), he called me up and sold her down the river.

He said "as soon as I move out, my parents are dead to me". I said: "do you hear yourself".? His response was more of the same nonsense and hate filled ragings, telling me "how dare she talk to my girlfriend, I never gave her permission to speak to my girlfriend".

I just stared at the phone because this kind of behavior is so foreign to me, my brain couldn't process this.

The stuff that comes out of his mouth (sober or not sober), is one for the books.

Last night she told me 'we have to get him out of the house but we don't want to evict him, we don't want to hurt his feelings".

?????????????????????????????????????????????????? ?????????????

I said: "I have to ask you a question (I really wanted to hear the answer because his rantings have blown me away).

I said "I want to know how you got over the fact that he had called me up 5 times, sold you down the river (he was NOT drunk when he did this).

She knew what he had told me (all of it), I was very diplomatic when I told her and I made sure she wanted to hear what he said. Not an easy thing to do to another mother.

So last night I said "Please enlighten me how you can get over the fact of all the stuff he told me, for example, you and your husband will be dead to him once he moves out, and he can't stand you, and you can't talk to his girlfriend".

I said "You really give new meaning to the term unconditional love". How do you do this?"

She said: (and this really confuses me).

She said: 'Well, I don't hold grudges, and he has a really good job, makes lots of money, and we want him to buy a house, so we are bringing a real estate agent over to talk to him".

I said "and what if he doesn't want to listen, or cooperate (like he did when they had the intervention, and he walked out of the house).

She said: "Well, I feel bad for him, and we want to do everything in an easy way to get him out of here, so we can't evict him".

I said: "I give you a lot of credit, most parents would have never put up with 4 hospitalizations, and all the stuff that he put you through (never mind what he said to me over the phone".

I just wanted t understand how this guy is not made to be accountable for ANYTHING he does.

He doesn't give them the time of day. He comes home from work, and goes out all night again.

I know this is his business, but (and this is where i get confused).

Isnt' the purpose of dealing with an alcoholic on the premises, to make him ACCOUNTABLE FOR HIS BEHAVIOR.?

Maybe I'm wrong, but I don't understand that they don't go to Al-anon meetings, that they said they were going to get him out of the house, but now that he is back to work and goes out all night, all they want to do is bring a real estate agent over and talk to him about buying a house and moving out.

Am I not getting this in my brain?

Aren't people supposed to hit bottom or something and be made accountable??

If this continues, we all know there is going to be another (5th), hospitalization.

I'm not going to be on the other end of the phone going "oh yeah, I know, you poor thing".

4 times is enough in my opinion.

Isn't what they are doing called enabling? Buying him dinner, giving him a roof over his head, etc. etc.

You see, my son is a gambler, and I distanced myself a long time ago. I went to Gam-anon meetings, I followed the program.

My friends have told me "We don't want to be like you, we want our children in our lives". "We don't want to lose them".

Who wants to lose children??? No one wants that.

But if you follow the precepts of the Gam-anon and Al-anon, you learn not to enable.

Right??

Yes they are enabling.

Aren't these the same people who all drink? She drinks to celebrate her four days of sobriety. Her hubby gets so drunk he passes out before he can shut off the car when he gets home from a night of drinking.

What is hard for you to understand is not so much the part about their interaction with their son, that is just a small part in the whole puzzle that is their dysfunctional household.

You have to look at the whole picture. At this point they don't care, they just want him out and are willing to overlook whatever is said or done, pay any amount, to see that they can give him a push. Then she can drink to celebrate that she has her house back. They can both celebrate.

I predict that he will not be out for long. He is ill and abusing his body, he will be back in the hospital, lose the job and house which they are probably putting their name on some papers somewhere for and he will move back in. Sad to say.

As I said before, if I were you I would not even discuss their son and his situation with them. You cannot sway them. All you say is falling on deaf ears. Now if she begins to talk of getting help for herself then by all means be there for her but don't let them suck you into their drama. They often have a tendency to feed on it.

You are such a good friend, I know it is mind boggling and you worry so about them and want them to see through it all what it is that they are doing.

When I was in outpatient rehab there were women in there who had small children, babies that had been taken away from them and they were at rehab because it was part of the requirement to try to get their babies and children back. You would be amazed at how many of them dropped out of rehab to go back out on the street to do drugs and drink instead.

There are thousands of grandparents out there that are raising their grandchildren because the parents are addicts.

Hi.

No these are two separate families. I started a thread "I want to help a friend". That explains the whole story. She's the mom of a 30 year old alcoholic and she drinks BECAUSE HE DRINKS.

Crazy no??

She was sober for 5 days and then she started. She says "I just don't care anymore".

I have no response to that.

But the other family....the one where the guy was dead drunk in front of his house, well, they live around the corner from me., and yes, the whole family does drink (these are the people who lost their son on 9/11).

I guess people will drink for any reason (if they want to drink). They drink to be happy, when they are sad, when it starts to rain, etc.

People just drink.

I don't get it, but then again, alcohol was never my problem. Food was my drug of choice. For most of my life.

Thank the lord, I got a handle on that one.


And yeah, I know MANY GRANDPARENTS who raise their grandkids because the moms and dads, drink and drug.

Very sad indeed!!!

mel