Homecoming Pt. 2
Having A. in the house this past week has been really nice. Maybe it's a mom thing, but when we are all together under one roof, there is a comfort, a settling, knowing all is well, that all chicks are accounted for. I've missed him in the kitchen...he's got a natural feel for flavors and can whip up a killer meal from whatever is available. He'll also eat just about anything, something that no one else in my immediate family shares with me, and it's a treat to share our food interests.
Before he came home this time, S. commented that this visit would probably reveal a different A., possibly one we hadn't seen yet--A. the man. He's been working 40 hours a week, paying bills, supporting himself, working it all out. And there are some changes I've seen in him...good changes. And it's true...we did see a different A.
He's much more relaxed and in control of himself. He shares his smile without hesitation, something that he had lost. It reminds me of a poem that I keep in my wallet, one that I cut out when A. first started retreating....into himself....away from us. It goes like this:
Teenagers by Pat Mora
One day they disappear
into their rooms.
Doors and lips shut
and we become strangers
in our own home.
I pace the hall, hear whispers,
a code I knew but can't remember,
mouthed by mouths I taught to speak.
Years later the door opens.
I see faces I once held,
open as sunflowers in my hands. I see
familiar skin now stretched on long bodies
that move past me
glowing almost like pearls.
Today....A. is glowing like a pearl. He's a warm sunflower. He has emerged as both a familiar soul and a newfound gem of himself....this is a beautiful thing.
The little ones really loved having him home. I think this time though it was hard on them when he left. They understand now that he is not staying home when they see him, they understand the moment is fleeting. G. hugged on A. with such genuine love and affection is was touching. A. just loved him up...with smiles and playful acceptance. SB was a bit more reserved than usual...her little girl shyness surfaced, and at times I saw her holding back some of her thoughts and feelings when A. didn't want to spend every second with her playing backgammon or taking another walk or any of the hundred things she might have dreamed up to get his attention. She was the one who took it the worst when he left. That whole day she had a look on her face at times that was just empty. I'd ask how she was feeling, if she was missing A. and she would get tearful, come over and bury herself in me, and cry a bit. Though they are 10 years apart, and I always knew this day would come where he would no longer be in the house, and the sibling relationships would change from the distance. And so we change.
A. shared with S. how he was working on "untying the knots" in thinking about old friendships. As much as he resists 12-step methodology right now, he is using it. He is changing his playthings, playground, and playmates. He was explaining to S. that there are some friends that he feels obligated to contact, yet he knows that it's time to "untie the knots" and move on...and so he does this little by little. He contacted very few of his old friends this visit.
An old using friend of his picked him up to take him to the airport, THE using friend--the one who introduced him to heroin and went spiraling down the black hole with him. They were best friends at one time, although A. recently shared that they are growing apart and changing. I had not seen him in quite a while, and I hear that he is clean off and on. After a very long hug (as much as he's the ONE friend that I wish A. could break all ties with, I care for him and always feel a sense of relief that he too is still alive) I immediately assessed him when he came to the house. I noticed two tattoos on the inside of each arm after we let go of the hug, and I grabbed his hands in mine and asked to see them. He showed me them, and as I was looking I noticed what seemed to be two needle marks near the bend in his arm. There was also a raised red bump right in the fold of his inner elbow, which I looked at skeptically but wrote off as possible scar tissue. I said nothing at all...played it off; yet, the moment I saw those marks, it all came back to me. The feelings of helplessness....the incredible fear. My instinct to protect A. kicked in, and once they were out the door, on the way to the airport, I called A. and shared what I had seen and my reservations. It's a crazy thing really. Two needles marks...and I'm back to imagining A. getting sucked into that circle of drugs again, yet I couldn't imagine him using heroin again. Generally, the thought of it makes him sick, he says. Literally sick...a repulsion, he explains. On the phone, he simply said, "Mom, I want to live healthy. I am healthy. You need to trust me." And I know this...I trust that. But it's such a scary thing to realize that I live daily in control of myself, in letting go of my connection to his addiction, yet in one moment, it rushes back.
C., a new friend, said to me last night, while discussing this with some friends, that no matter how much you release yourself from their habits, it still doesn't take away the fact that it affects you and the feelings that are a part of those reactions...out of the deep love for your child. It was nice to hear that validation...that it IS okay to feel nervous, scared, protective. Thank you, C., you're right, I do *feel*... I *know* it's not in my control...and I have let that go...I have given that up. I no longer try to control his life. It's his to live...but don't think for a minute that I've become numb to the feelings it brings about. I've simply learned how to manage them more effectively.
So off A. goes...back to Boulder. Then Burning Man at the end of August. Then who knows. He doesn't know...he's excited that he doesn't know. He is living in the moment in a way that I sometimes wish I had been able to do myself when I was his age.
Before he came home this time, S. commented that this visit would probably reveal a different A., possibly one we hadn't seen yet--A. the man. He's been working 40 hours a week, paying bills, supporting himself, working it all out. And there are some changes I've seen in him...good changes. And it's true...we did see a different A.
He's much more relaxed and in control of himself. He shares his smile without hesitation, something that he had lost. It reminds me of a poem that I keep in my wallet, one that I cut out when A. first started retreating....into himself....away from us. It goes like this:
Teenagers by Pat Mora
One day they disappear
into their rooms.
Doors and lips shut
and we become strangers
in our own home.
I pace the hall, hear whispers,
a code I knew but can't remember,
mouthed by mouths I taught to speak.
Years later the door opens.
I see faces I once held,
open as sunflowers in my hands. I see
familiar skin now stretched on long bodies
that move past me
glowing almost like pearls.
Today....A. is glowing like a pearl. He's a warm sunflower. He has emerged as both a familiar soul and a newfound gem of himself....this is a beautiful thing.
The little ones really loved having him home. I think this time though it was hard on them when he left. They understand now that he is not staying home when they see him, they understand the moment is fleeting. G. hugged on A. with such genuine love and affection is was touching. A. just loved him up...with smiles and playful acceptance. SB was a bit more reserved than usual...her little girl shyness surfaced, and at times I saw her holding back some of her thoughts and feelings when A. didn't want to spend every second with her playing backgammon or taking another walk or any of the hundred things she might have dreamed up to get his attention. She was the one who took it the worst when he left. That whole day she had a look on her face at times that was just empty. I'd ask how she was feeling, if she was missing A. and she would get tearful, come over and bury herself in me, and cry a bit. Though they are 10 years apart, and I always knew this day would come where he would no longer be in the house, and the sibling relationships would change from the distance. And so we change.
A. shared with S. how he was working on "untying the knots" in thinking about old friendships. As much as he resists 12-step methodology right now, he is using it. He is changing his playthings, playground, and playmates. He was explaining to S. that there are some friends that he feels obligated to contact, yet he knows that it's time to "untie the knots" and move on...and so he does this little by little. He contacted very few of his old friends this visit.
An old using friend of his picked him up to take him to the airport, THE using friend--the one who introduced him to heroin and went spiraling down the black hole with him. They were best friends at one time, although A. recently shared that they are growing apart and changing. I had not seen him in quite a while, and I hear that he is clean off and on. After a very long hug (as much as he's the ONE friend that I wish A. could break all ties with, I care for him and always feel a sense of relief that he too is still alive) I immediately assessed him when he came to the house. I noticed two tattoos on the inside of each arm after we let go of the hug, and I grabbed his hands in mine and asked to see them. He showed me them, and as I was looking I noticed what seemed to be two needle marks near the bend in his arm. There was also a raised red bump right in the fold of his inner elbow, which I looked at skeptically but wrote off as possible scar tissue. I said nothing at all...played it off; yet, the moment I saw those marks, it all came back to me. The feelings of helplessness....the incredible fear. My instinct to protect A. kicked in, and once they were out the door, on the way to the airport, I called A. and shared what I had seen and my reservations. It's a crazy thing really. Two needles marks...and I'm back to imagining A. getting sucked into that circle of drugs again, yet I couldn't imagine him using heroin again. Generally, the thought of it makes him sick, he says. Literally sick...a repulsion, he explains. On the phone, he simply said, "Mom, I want to live healthy. I am healthy. You need to trust me." And I know this...I trust that. But it's such a scary thing to realize that I live daily in control of myself, in letting go of my connection to his addiction, yet in one moment, it rushes back.
C., a new friend, said to me last night, while discussing this with some friends, that no matter how much you release yourself from their habits, it still doesn't take away the fact that it affects you and the feelings that are a part of those reactions...out of the deep love for your child. It was nice to hear that validation...that it IS okay to feel nervous, scared, protective. Thank you, C., you're right, I do *feel*... I *know* it's not in my control...and I have let that go...I have given that up. I no longer try to control his life. It's his to live...but don't think for a minute that I've become numb to the feelings it brings about. I've simply learned how to manage them more effectively.
So off A. goes...back to Boulder. Then Burning Man at the end of August. Then who knows. He doesn't know...he's excited that he doesn't know. He is living in the moment in a way that I sometimes wish I had been able to do myself when I was his age.