When is the wedding, Stands?
I think you need to give yourself permission to be a mom whose daughter is getting married until one week after the wedding.
This should be a special time and drugs ~ not difficult child but whatever drug he has been using the past few days ~ are taking that away from you and from your daughter, too.
And from husband and easy child.
Stupid drugs.
And difficult child will not stop putting them into his mouth.
He knows what he is doing, he has to know how important a milestone this wedding is for the entire family ~ but he will not stop putting those crappy drugs into his system.
His choice.
Now, you need to make a choice, too.
You can let the drugs shrivel the wonder of this time in your life, and in the lives of every member of your family, or you can make a different choice.
You can decide, not to turn difficult child away or read him the riot act or anything else having to do with difficult child, but to cherish this time in your life, and in the life of your family.
There is a rhythm to the life of a family.
This should be a time of fruition for you and your husband.
That is what difficult child's addiction is destroying.
So many of us here on the site have had to learn to choose joy, Stands, whatever is going on with our addicted child.
You can pick that, too.
But you have to be really cold to do it.
Choose not to worry about difficult child today.
No mourning difficult child today.
Today is one of the last days your daughter is your daughter first. After the wedding, she will be someone's wife and then, someone's mother.
You will never have this time with your daughter again.
You will never have these last days before your daughter becomes a married woman, with a married woman's responsibilities, to share with your husband, again.
The two of you should take your daughter to a fancy dinner with your other children. Or to pizza, or for pizza at home ~ whatever you can afford. Talk and laugh and remember your family to each other. Remember all the good times, all the Christmases and birthdays and the times you laughed and were so in love with each other.
You deserve that Stands, but more importantly, your husband and your other children deserve to have that good time with you.
Don't let difficult child's addiction reach in and destroy the heart of your family.
What happened to difficult child is a tragedy. Name it and move away from it. difficult child's addiction is a separate, painful entity.
Don't let it ruin these last few weeks for your family.
The addiction will still be there after the wedding, when this precious, never to be done again time is passed.
Your daughter needs to be proud, and strong, and cherished as she enters her new life.
Don't let difficult child's addiction tarnish that.
Tell difficult child that you love him, but you are not going to let this stupid drug addiction infect this wonderful time for your family.
Keep that as your watchword during this time.
Otherwise, when you look back on this time in your family, all you will have is remembrance of difficult child's stupid drug addiction.
Choose not to let the drugs steal this time from you or from your family.
You are the mom.
You need to protect the rest of the family from difficult child's stupid addiction to drugs.
Drugs kill everything they touch.
Your job as the mom is to keep the rest of the family safe from the effects of the drugs.
I love my son?
But I hate the drugs, and the lost time and the pain and the sadness they have cost ME.
Make another choice, Stands.
Be cold.
Be the mother to your other children, and the wife to your husband, who protects your family.
How we make it through these times has so much to do with where we stand and how we see what is happening to us.
Even if you don't mean it, Stands?
Carry on as normally as you can with the rest of your family.
Don't let the drugs destroy that, too.
Keep posting.
It helps so much.
Barbara
