Memory Lane

Mario:   So Roz, what is your first memory of childhood?
Roz:        I remember my father’s death. I was 10 years old.  He died of a massive heart
attack.  In fact I don’t remember anything prior to being 10 yrs. old.  and I don’t
remember anything until the age of 16 when I smoked my first joint.

My father’s death changed our lives.  It changed our family.  It changed my mother.  Actually,  she died too.  She died mentally & spiritually.  I had a brother who was 21 years old and another brother who was 30 years old.  They adored my father.  I was Daddy’s little
girl.  My middle brother had peptic ulcers.  “A nervous stomach” as my mom called it.  He almost died. He was so handsome and he could sing really well.  My oldest brother became my father.  He raised me.  He was married with 3 children and lived an hour away. He was strict. He was my God.  He was my hero.  He took on the role of my father.

I was angry at my mother.  She abandoned me.  She cried for days and nights on end.  She sat on the end of the couch and cried with her black stockings rolled around her ankles.  We went from a family of five to me and my mother.  I hated being at home.

I suffered from the disease of Italianism as well as the disease of addiction.  I had a pit in
my stomach.  A hole in my stomach.  I didn’t know what it was.  I could not fill it.
When I picked up marijuana for the first time the hole was gone.  I felt so much better.  I could go on and on and on …………..I was a Hippie. I grew up in the ’70’s.   My mother blamed my addiction on the way I looked at the BEATLES the night they were on the Ed Sullivan show.   I used every drug there was between the ages of 16-29.

I started using heroin at the age of 20.  All of my problems were gone…………..so I thought.  Why do we use?   Why can’t we stop?

I’ll have to write more later.  Remembering what life was like before I entered the world of recovery is painful.  Was I born an addict?   Did I use because I was extremely depressed and I self medicated?   The only way I could function was to get high first.

What was your first childhood memory?

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WELCOME To A Heroine Story!!

Hello!

WELCOME !   This blog is dedicated to ASI (Addiction Specialists, Inc.)…..and to the many, many patients who have gone through treatment there and who miss the therapeutic value that the family atmosphere gave them.  April 30,2016 ASI was shut down by the PA Dept. of Health ………….. it was totally unfair and unjustifiable.  October 8, 2015  the FBI unexpectedly raided the facility.  It was a nightmare.    The loss was almost unbearable.  ASI was not a methadone clinic.  ASI was not a drug & alcohol rehab.   ASI was not a suboxone program.

ASI was Family.

Be prepared to hear the ups and downs, struggles and successes of a life you could never imagine.   Addiction is an ugly illness and it causes major pain and suffering for families as well as addicts. If you live with an addict, give them a new name.  They are two people.  Two very very different people.  Know who you are talking to at all times.  If their birth name is Laura, you can name her Lisa.  If their birth name is Robert you can name him Randy.  One of them is the active addict and the other is the recovering addict.  Let me take you on a walk down memory lane.