one year

This time last year Mom was lying in a coma on life support after flatlining twice. I was on my way to see her with my stomach in knots and my hope flickering like a dying star. They said she’d be a vegetable. They said she’d be brain dead. They said she may never wake up. Well, it’s a year later and not only did she wake up, but she’s clean and kicking ass. ⁣
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Today we’re celebrating her one year sober anniversary. It almost doesn’t seem real. I’ve been waiting my whole life for her to be clean, and now, here she is, sitting on my lawn in the sunshine with a fresh face, clear mind, a strong heart, and curls down her back like wild stands of English ivy. We ate avocado toast for lunch and marveled at how well she’s adjusted to her life here in North Carolina. ⁣
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We’ve come a long way since this picture, taken back in 1986, the year I was born. She was strung out and had been awake for nine days. We lived in a roach infested apartment with matted carpet and blankets over the windows. Stacks of stolen things grew taller in the corners of the bedroom while Mom and Dad turned into piles of bones from living off nothing but chocolate bars and methamphetamines. ⁣
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But now, here we are. ⁣
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It took her almost forty years, but she did it. Almost a lifetime of meth use—smoking, snorting, slamming, seven years in state prison for burglarizing over three hundred homes, a couple more years in jail behind bullet proof glass for criminal threats and receiving stolen property, and two episodes of cardiac arrest, but she finally did it. She changed her life. ⁣
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Don’t ever give up on the ones you love. Don’t ever lose hope. Believe them when they say they’re trying to change. Lift them up even when they disappoint you. And most of all, love them anyway, regardless of where they are in their journey. I am so grateful for this day and the many days to come with her.