Nighttime phone calls are never good news when you\u2019re the mother of a drug addict. My phone rang at 10 o\u2019clock on a frigid Friday evening in January.<\/p>\n
\u201cMom, it\u2019s Ben.\u201d My 27-year-old son\u2019s voice had the forced it\u2019s-not-as-bad-as-it-sounds tone he used whenever his addiction took another disastrous turn.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat\u2019s going on?\u201d I asked, trying to control my own voice. After nearly a decade of doing everything I could to help my son overcome his pain-pill addiction, I\u2019d started going to Al-Anon meetings. I was learning\u2014slowly\u2014how powerless I was to solve Ben\u2019s problems. I\u2019d probably made things worse, enabled him, by rescuing him so many times over the years.<\/p>\n
\u201cI got kicked out of the sober-living house,\u201d Ben said. \u201cIt wasn\u2019t my fault! They found the anxiety medication I was taking\u2014remember, you refilled the prescription for me? I didn\u2019t realize I wasn\u2019t allowed to have it.\u201d<\/p>\n
I slumped into a chair. \u201cWhere are you?\u201d I asked. \u201cAt Orlando\u2019s church.\u201d Orlando was Ben\u2019s probation officer. \u201cHe called the sober-living house and they agreed to take me back next week so long as all of the medication is out of my system.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThat sounds positive,\u201d I said.<\/p>\n
Ben paused before saying, \u201cThere\u2019s just one thing. I need you to come to Colorado to stay with me in a motel until the house takes me back. I\u2019m broke, I don\u2019t have anywhere else to go and I don\u2019t trust myself alone.\u201d<\/p>\n
I stared out the kitchen window into the darkness, wishing\u2014as I\u2019d wished every single minute of the past 10 years\u2014that my husband, Rick, was there with me. Rick died of cancer when Ben was 17. Ben\u2019s older brother, Danny, had already left for college. Ben was devoted to his dad and incredibly close to his brother. Rick had been a National Park Service ranger and we\u2019d moved around a lot when the boys were young, before settling down in Estes Park, a small Colorado mountain town, where Ben still lived. We were a close-knit family. Rick\u2019s death shattered all of us.<\/p>\n
Ben\u2014intuitive, creative, sensitive\u2014suffered most of all. He numbed the pain with alcohol, then pills. He was 25 when he broke into a pharmacy, stole bagfuls of pills, then stared straight into the security camera\u2014a last-ditch plea for help. When the image was published in the local paper, everyone knew exactly who it was, just as Ben had hoped they would.<\/p>\n
Over the years, even after moving from Estes Park to teach elementary school in Taos, New Mexico, I\u2019d covered up for Ben, rationalized, helped him to find jobs, paid his rent, loaned him money\u2014basically everything you\u2019re not supposed to do for an addict. I loved Ben. I leaned on the boys after Rick died. I wasn\u2019t thinking clearly.<\/p>\n
Well, now <\/em>I was thinking clearly. Everything inside me shouted, Let him clean up his own mess!<\/em><\/p>\n What I said, though, was, \u201cLet me talk to Orlando.\u201d<\/p>\n Orlando corroborated Ben\u2019s story, with an additional frightening detail: Ben had so much medication in his system that a detox center refused to take him because they feared he would go into seizures.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re in danger of losing him,\u201d Orlando said. \u201cI think you should come.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cOkay,\u201d I said with a sigh.<\/p>\n I left a message with the principal at my school\u2014we\u2019d just returned from Christmas break; it was a terrible time for me to leave\u2014and got on the road before sunrise.<\/p>\n Driving along the snowy highway, I repeated the Al-Anon prayer a friend from the group had prayed with me when I called to tell her what I was doing: God, I offer myself to you. May I always do your will.<\/em><\/p>\n My mind groped for happy memories. I remembered the boys skiing off our roof after a massive snowfall in Sequoia National Park. Endless football games in the yard no matter where we lived. We were huge Denver Broncos fans\u2014Rick and I met in high school in Colorado and some of our first dates were at Mile High Stadium (Rick\u2019s family had season tickets). We took the boys to games starting when they were toddlers. After Rick died, we kept going. The sight of those blue-and-orange uniforms made us feel closer to Rick.<\/p>\n I kept praying the Al-Anon prayer. But I still had no idea what to do when I pulled up at Orlando\u2019s church in downtown Fort Collins, the town where the sober-living house was. Ben was in the sanctuary, sitting by a set of drums on the stage. He looked tired and pale but not as bad as I\u2019d feared. I hugged him for a long time, reluctant to let him go.<\/p>\n \u201cI like it here,\u201d Ben said. \u201cI spent the whole night listening to music and reading the Bible.\u201d He showed me a well-thumbed Bible he\u2019d picked up somewhere. I tried not to ask too many questions. I was afraid of the answers.<\/p>\n I checked us into a motel and we got some breakfast at a diner.<\/p>\n \u201cThe sober-living house gave me a list of businesses that employ recovering addicts,\u201d Ben said, pulling out a sheet of paper. \u201cCan we see if any are hiring?\u201d<\/p>\n My eyebrows rose, but I couldn\u2019t say no to that. We drove around town and Ben filled out applications.<\/p>\n The next morning, Sunday, Ben said he wanted to go to Orlando\u2019s church. My eyebrows rose again. I couldn\u2019t remember the last time Ben went to a church service.<\/p>\n I was even more surprised when he got up to help collect the offering. He was already volunteering? The pastor, it turned out, had played football in college. Ben listened intently to the sermon.<\/p>\n \u201cWhatever challenges you\u2019re facing,\u201d the pastor said, \u201cwhenever you feel most alone\u2014that\u2019s when God is closest. He will never turn his back on you. He will never give up on you.\u201d<\/p>\n Ben lingered after the service, then asked if I could give rides to some guys he knew from the sober-living house.<\/p>\n Finally it was just Ben and me in the car. I felt conflicted. I wanted to be encouraged by his behavior. I wanted to keep him going in this new direction. But doing something he should be able to do for himself\u2014that went against everything I\u2019d been learning in Al-Anon. Plus, addicts are experts at making you think they\u2019re turning a corner. I\u2019d been fooled before. Many times.<\/p>\n \u201cMom,\u201d he said quietly. \u201cThere\u2019s something I haven\u2019t told you.\u201d<\/p>\n Here it comes, <\/em>I thought.<\/p>\n \u201cThose anxiety pills I had at the sober-living house\u2014they kicked me out because I took all of them. Mom, I tried to kill myself.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cOh, Ben,\u201d I said.<\/p>\n \u201cBut I heard something during the sermon this morning,\u201d he continued. \u201cThe pastor said God never gives up on people like me. That sounds like Dad. He never gave up either. Dad would have wanted me to live. And I think God does too. I feel like I\u2019m ready to take this whole recovery thing seriously now.\u201d<\/p>\n I hardly knew what to say. I told Ben I hoped he meant it because I wanted him to live too.<\/p>\n Suddenly he grinned. \u201cHey, I know the perfect way to celebrate. Let\u2019s go watch the Broncos\u2019 playoff game!\u201d<\/p>\n It was a huge relief to sit down at a restaurant and let our beloved Broncos distract me from my overflowing emotions. Ben and I cheered and pumped our fists every time the Broncos moved the chains. The game was tied at the end of the fourth quarter.<\/p>\n A commercial came on. \u201cTime to go to church,\u201d Ben said. \u201cThe evening service starts in fifteen minutes.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWhat?\u201d I exclaimed. \u201cThe game is about to go into overtime. We can\u2019t miss that! Besides, we\u2019ve already been to church once today.\u201d<\/p>\n Ben stood up. \u201cMom, we\u2019ve got to go.\u201d<\/p>\n I hate to admit it, but I was seriously irked. Walking to the car, Ben said he\u2019d noticed that Demaryius Thomas, the Broncos\u2019 wide receiver, had been in single coverage the entire game. If the quarterback, Tim Tebow, could get a pass to Thomas over the middle, Ben said, Thomas could easily elude his defender and score.<\/p>\n \u201cWe won\u2019t know if he does, since we have to go to church,\u201d I said testily.<\/p>\n Ben relented. \u201cLet\u2019s just see what\u2019s happening,\u201d he said, poking his head into another restaurant that had the game on. I followed him. Right at that moment, Tim Tebow threw an arcing pass to Thomas, who danced around his defender and ran 80 yards for a touchdown. Ben and I stared at each other in elated astonishment.<\/p>\n \u201cOkay,\u201d said Ben, \u201clet\u2019s go to church.\u201d<\/p>\n There was no sermon at the evening service. Members of the congregation got up to talk about how God was at work in their lives. I was startled when Ben suddenly brushed by me and walked up the aisle.<\/p>\n He stood at the microphone, glancing nervously at the crowd. Then he told how he\u2019d been struggling to find his way out of addiction for a long time.<\/p>\n He held up the Bible I\u2019d seen him reading the day before. \u201cMy probation officer recently gave me this,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019ve been thinking about a verse I found, John 3:19: \u2018The light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n He paused and I could tell he was summoning his resolve. \u201cI am tired of walking in darkness,\u201d he said. \u201cI am ready to step into the light. I am a Christian.\u201d<\/p>\n The congregation burst into applause, and the sound buoyed me up like no Broncos playoff win ever had. I felt my own darkness lift. For the first time I saw clearly that God wanted me, too, to take Ben\u2019s recovery seriously. In a way I\u2019d also been an addict\u2014addicted to enabling his addiction. But my job was simply to love my son. And to give him wholeheartedly to the One who loves perfectly and who never gives up on us.<\/p>\n Ben returned to his seat beside me and I hugged him for a long time. Then I let him go.<\/p>\n Today, Ben is married and works full-time as a mentor and cook at a residential addiction-recovery center in Taos. He\u2019s finishing college and he plans to spend his life helping addicts do what he did\u2014step out of the darkness and into the light.<\/p>\n I\u2019m confident he\u2019ll do an excellent job. I was his first success story.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Nighttime phone calls are never good news when you\u2019re the mother of a drug addict. My phone rang at 10 o\u2019clock on a frigid Friday evening in January. \u201cMom, it\u2019s Ben.\u201d My 27-year-old son\u2019s voice had the forced it\u2019s-not-as-bad-as-it-sounds tone he used whenever his addiction took another disastrous turn. \u201cWhat\u2019s going on?\u201d I asked, trying […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":29205,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[193,185],"tags":[194,25,16,51,70,213],"ppma_author":[778],"class_list":["post-21094","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-addiction-and-recovery","category-stories-of-faith-and-hope","tag-addiction","tag-family","tag-god","tag-inspirational-stories","tag-mother","tag-son"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n