Invasion of the Living Dead

You are right, Fizz. How can I make people aware of the problem if they cannot understand what it is that I am trying to say. I tried to write it out plain, but it became unbearable. Yet, because I know it is very important that people know that prescription drug addiction is not only a growing concern, but that it is causing deaths, I will try again.

After a year of abusing prescription drugs, my daughter hung herself.

It began at a party consisting of young adults and teenagers. After having a few drinks, she was encouraged to try Clonazepam. It had been prescribed to the young woman who was hosting the party. Judgement impaired and reasoning that there was no danger since a doctor prescribed them, my daughter swallowed two pills. By the time the party ended a week later, my daughter had, in her mindless state, consumed an assortment of pills that included Clonazepam, Valium, Prozac, Percocet and Ritalin as well as snorting cocaine and smoking marijuana. Apparently, most of the guests there had something to contribute.

I became aware that there was a problem when I dropped into her apartment to visit near the week’s end. She was asleep in her bed, and my five year old grandson was nowhere to be found. When I tried to wake her to inquire about his whereabouts, she would not wake. I had to violently shake her to rouse her. When she manage to stand, it was obvious that she was having trouble focusing. When I was finally able to get her to understand that her son was missing, she could not tell me where he was. I began a search with her stumbling along behind me. We found him at the next apartment playing with neighbour’s child. Assuming that she was drunk, I left her to sleep it off while I took my grandson home with me. A week later, when my daughter assured me that everything was fine, I returned my grandson to his mother. She had explained to me that she had stupidly tried a pill which had caused her, in combination with beer, to be in the state that I found her. I trusted that she had made a err in judgement. I was not informed about the week-long party and all of its details until after she died.

Two weeks later, I called on the first day that my grandson was to start school. My daughter answered the phone to say that she was going to wait until the next day to enroll him. There was no reason for this, so I took him to school myself and enrolled him. When I went back to speak with her, she broke down saying that she was an emotional mess. She stated that she needed a break. So, once again, my grandson came to stay with me. He never returned to live with his mother again.

Things went from bad to worse. I asked her to consult a doctor for help. The doctor prescribed pills. Although they were from the same group as Clonazepam, they were a milder form, so they did not have the same numbing effect. So, she simply went from doctor to doctor trying to get them to prescribe what she wanted. Every doctor gave her a prescription for something, as she would tell them she could not take whatever the last doctor prescribed. But, they would not prescribe Clonazepam. So, she started buying them on the streets. If Clonazepam was not available, she would try something else that was stated to be “just as good”. She began to accumulate a considerable amount of friends and she acquired a boyfriend. I would realize later that all these new relationships were based on co-dependency.

Although I was aware that there was something wrong, I never knew about her addiction. I knew that she was smoking marijuana occasionally and taking the pills that the doctor prescribed. Her emotional outbursts, depression and rage were all adverse side effects of the pills, but I did not know it until it was too late. When her emotional unbalance peaked, I called around the city of Halifax to find help, but I could not find any immediate aid. Since she did not have private insurance, my only choices were to put her on a long waiting list for help or to make a call that would prompt a drastic intervention. I did not think the problem was dire enough to enlist that type of help.

The week before she died, everything seemed to be going quite well. I sent her son over to spend a night in a bid to get her back on track. Later that week, her relationship began to turn violent due to the emotional instability caused by the mutual use of drugs. Her boyfriend walked out. No one called to say that her boyfriend had left, nor did I know that she had no one with her. It was common for someone to give me warning that my daughter was having a bad day. He returned two days later, gave her four Valium and then left again. The next day, he returned. While he was in the shower, she went into the closet and hung herself.

The consumption of four Valium, in combination with the emotional unheaval caused by a year of prescription drug use, guided her to act on an irrational impulse.