IT SNAPPED — KATHY BUCKERT
/Geoffrey is a drug addict.
I find myself praying for a miracle. Playing his savior has been my role for far too long. I fight his battles at school and with his father. Enabling comes at a price, a price that could cost his life if I don’t wake up and see my son is in trouble. I am a control freak, but I make one plea into the heavens: “Do whatever you need to do, but please spare his life.” My prayer is a trajectory of surrendering my will.
Our intervention is ready to begin. My husband calls Geoffrey to join us in the living room, the anger in his eyes shows our plan was compromised. I told his girlfriend. I simply shoot her a stern look when she sits next to him on the couch. She enables him. She treats him to her drugs. She is her own disease.
It occurs to me that this is happening because we left rural Vermont. Nothing in New York can match the mountains, fresh air, and good people that surrounded us there. I am no longer a stay at home mom. Although I am here for him when he arrives home, it is not enough. I trusted my instincts. I listened to his promises. The cost of believing: drugs are ravaging his body. The skeletal remains of our lifeless familial ties are fighting for one last breath.
When we start the intervention, I inventory the reasons why we love him. My love has weathered so many storms from the time of your conception to this very moment. I have been your advocate. I have been your defender. I have carried your anger in my soul. Let’s bury our shame. Let’s keep our mother and son bond intact. Together. Let’s. Just. Be. Stronger.
He listens to the letters written by the family.
I am helpless. I am ravaged by his decisions. I need my own intervention to stop controlling him and let him become his own man. Letting him hit rock bottom may help him fight his way to the surface again—on his own. I am losing my son because he refuses to get help. He is leaving our home, our place of safety. His drugs have taken my place. And I cry. Not because my son is heading toward a life of uncertainty, but because I know he is resilient. He will scratch his way back to the surface and so will I.
Kathy Buckert holds a Master’s Degree in Education from St. Michael’s College in Vermont. She also holds an M.F.A in Creative Writing from Goddard College’s low-residency program in Plainfield, Vermont. Her work has appeared in Stories: The Magazine, Riverlit, The Blue Hour, Black Mirror Magazine, Electric Rather, Silver Birch Press, and other publications. She is an adjunct assistant professor at Monroe Community College in Rochester, New York.
