Showing Our Love Shared

My journey officially began Monday, October 1st, 2018 with a call at 6:47 am telling me they had my child. How I push forward through this journey I know will always be up to me. But I have learned through the most painful experience in my life, that I have and will continue to make a difference in the world and I will do it in "My Child's Name", and all the other deeply missed children and loved one's names, taken while experimenting for the first time, or who survived their first to face a brutal battle against an unforgiving disease called Addiction.
 

Many think those addicted to substances are like those seen in the late 1960 and 70's Crime cop sitcoms, the seedy characters in the movies, or those depicted in the documentaries about the small town being ravaged by overdoses until they realized it is their child fighting Addiction.
 

It is true when it's said "Ignorance is bliss" until It's Not.
 

I heard these words from my child once I discovered her struggle ~
 

"I never thought it would be me who would become Addicted, that happened to others, not me.  The majority of those my age experiment, dabble here and there, and can just walk away, so I never felt I was any different. Addiction was just there one day and the only thing that could stop the blinding screaming panic was to keep taking it, the Xanax. It made me feel my life was so catastrophic every morning I woke,  it only got worse. It somehow called my name out loud. It all looked different from a distance though but drugs are so accessible Mom. I just want what made me feel life was so catastrophic back because now I know what real catastrophic is. I am sorry I never told you, it just showed up one day and I thought I could handle it myself because of the type of person I am. I never knew it would get so out of control because I honestly didn't see it happening. I didn't tell you or ask for help because it was already just there, so why hurt you, the one "I Love the Most".
 

~Jena Marie Fuqua, Sunset 10.01.2018, 20-years old, her Addiction began slowly, from shared Xanax to prescriptions of her own after graduating from high school. Entering her first and only long-term treatment stay while the paperwork to begin her LPN program sat on her bed at home. Words spoken to me during her 111-day struggle against an unforgiving disease before one pill took her, it was Fentanyl.  
 

I never said, "Not My Child", I talked with her, but tragically not enough, or I didn't do enough listening. I understood the seriousness but not in a million years, just like my child felt, did I ever imagine Addiction would be the ending to our love story here on earth. Never in a million years would I have thought it would be me facing Addiction's Final Assault, a life without my child, my little bird 🐦 taken, and honestly neither did she. Even though those fighting Addiction understands the risk, the substance's powerful unwavering, and unforgiving force will make them blind to it.
 

Talk with your children, share my child's story and all the other beautiful loved ones' stories because innocence can be taken upon a single use of experimenting, or Addiction can just slip in the backdoor unannounced after a slow unexpected crawl. It can just show up with no options of giving it back during their lifetime. There is only finding and fighting harder than one can imagine to find recovery and to maintain it, or the tragic and painful outcome of the disease taking a child's last breath.
 

Unless you can read your child's mind don't ever think they will never experiment, or can't get lost, have their innocence taken, with no way to find their way back home... to you.
 

Never Say,  "Not My Child".

©Becky Fuqua-Spuhl 

 Jena's Mom 💋💋💋