Reverend Johnny Dragon

Do you ever have one of those days where every little thing seems to make you want to cry? It doesn’t have to be anything in particular that sets the tears a rolling, you know they are just there waiting for whatever excuse that seems appropriate. I am not afraid to admit that I have those days. A lot of people especially Men are afraid to express their emotions, except of course anger. That emotion appears to be acceptable no matter what. The point is, the very first day of the New Year has been a rather emotional one for me.

As everyone in my World knows I have spent pretty much the past decade working with Alcoholics and Drug Addicts. It absolutely would be a lie for me to say that it was a thankless job, because that just wouldn’t be true. I got to see a lot of miraculous stuff happen during my tenure. I got to see the hopeless find hope, the worthless find worth and the defeated find…umm…feet? Well you know what I mean. I also met a lot of Family Members who have gone out of their way over the years to keep me posted on their loved ones progress and who have always expressed their gratitude for the fact that God chose to use me to help change their loved ones lives. Of course there were always those rough Customers, but this piece isn’t really about them.

I am no longer in the field of Chemical Dependency and to be quite honest I probably could have picked a more noble way to say Goodbye to my vocation, however, my experience shows that probably just wouldn’t have been my style. There is also the fact that I am perfectly happy not to have that be my profession any more. Again, nothing negative about the profession. I know a quite a few people who work in the field of Chemical Dependency and the Vocation is fortunate to have them. I also know a lot of ridiculous ones as well, but hey, let’s face it, every profession have substandard performers. The point is, I feel like I accomplished what I set out to accomplish, I was good at what I did, and now I am done doing it. Very cut and dry! This probably bothers one or two people in my World, but let’s face it, it really kind of fits when you consider who we are dealing with here. God seems to look out for Children, Drunks and apparently Slackers. I have been all three at many times in my life.

In all of my experience working with Alcoholics and Drug Addicts, the one thing that took the most toll on me were the Individuals who made the decision to use drugs again and for whatever reason their bodies just could not handle the experience and they simply died. They did not get a freebie, or a do over, they just died a sad and lonely death and with them they took pieces of everyone who truly cared about them. That last line was not written to instill emotion, but rather a simple statement of fact. Addicts and Alcoholics use large quantities of substances as a Solution to the problem of being…well, being alive. In the process of using those substances the human body is pushed beyond its limits and it just shuts down. This is where it becomes ludicrous to think any one would consciously choose to do this. I am not talking about the ones who made a conscious decision to take their own lives, I am talking about the ones who fully intended to wake up the next morning and do it all again. I actually said that to a Social Worker once in an Emergency Room when she asked me to prove to her that I was not trying to kill myself. I looked her square in the eye and without missing a beat, I told her this. “My dear, I wasn’t trying to kill myself because I fully intended to do this again tomorrow.” Insane…I know.

There have been numerous people who I have worked very closely with over the past decade who have passed away due to addiction. Every single one of them have had an effect on me. On January 5th a Family in Corpus Christi will be remembering the 2nd Anniversary of the passing of their Son. He was in his late teens, still very much a Kid, a Kid who had made some very bad decisions. He received some narcotics after a visit to a local Emergency Room, went to bed at his Grandparents house and was found dead the next morning. His Mother called me that morning in hysterics and once again I experienced that feeling of extreme lacking, a lacking that comes with the realization of the fact that you are simply a human being who really has no power to stop death. It is a helpless and lonely feeling, You go home and you feel guilty that your Children are okay while another Family’s World is irrevocably shattered. You hug your Children tighter and you suddenly experience overwhelming anxiety every time they fall down or scrape their knee. You walk in the shoes of the loved one and you desperately hold on to those people who have gone before and are living their lives sober and successful. You bury yourself in work or something happens that becomes the distraction. For me, two days after the death of this young man, I was in a massive car accident where I broke my neck in three places and my back in two. I was pretty much incapacitated for awhile, pretty much pulling me out of the grieving process surrounding this young mans death. Now two years later, four days from the Anniversary of his death I am now faced with it once more. I found an Facebook Message that was sent to me on November 1st 2011. For some reason Facebook dumped it into a folder that I had no idea existed. I found it today and this is what she had written.

“You know you spent the most time with Brandon in those last months before this tragedy. I lost that as a mom; I didn’t get to see him. It would be nice and helpful for me emotionally if you could share your thoughts or feelings of Brandon in your life. I have to live with much guilt about playing the “tough love” card; it’s hard. Hope you find time to respond.” Then she sent a follow up message today based on my response to her. This is what she wrote, “I never blamed You for Brandon’s death …. I just wanted you to maybe give me some memories you have of my son I miss him soo much I remember when you were in the hospital you told me you had a dream of Brandon and y’all were making breakfast tacos and you could even smell the aroma anyway you were someone that Brandon really respected well and me too I hope you and your family are well …6 kids I can’t imagine… happy new year.”
Words have the ability to invoke so much emotion. I had pushed this young mans death so far below the surface of my emotional psyche and in one moment all the old wounds lay open and bare. I am glad that the emotions are there and I am glad that they are raw. I would not like myself very much if they weren’t. What I feel today is real and not medicated and those feelings belong to me damn it and I own them lock stock and barrel. There is a Mother in Corpus Christi who is constantly reminded of the loss of her Son. Not just another statistic of Drug Addiction but a living breathing piece of her soul. She brought him home from the Hospital when he was born and she gave him love and comfort. She was the one who put band aids on scrapes and kissed bruises better. She took him to school on his first day and told him to be brave even when he did not want to be. She watched him grow from a boy into a man and then she had to make hard decisions in an effort to help him over-come addiction. Finally she had to lay him to rest and say a final Goodbye that had never ever been a part of this deal called Motherhood. The below poem was pasted on her Facebook Page.

I guess I do understand why I am having one of those days…you know…the kind where tears hover on the edge of you eyelids…the kind of tears that hover on the edge of your soul… So I don’t know about you, but I think I am gonna go have myself a good cry, and then I am gonna try and tell a Mother what her son was like in the last three months before his death.

Hug those you love a little harder and a little longer and I wish you all a Happy New Year!

This entry was posted on Sunday, January 1st, 2012 at 8:32 pm. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.