Dying to Survive

by Rachael Keogh

  My mother and my grandmother cried when I told them the news. They never thought that they would see the day when I would be pregnant. My grandfather, being my grandfather, showed no emotion when he heard the news. ‘D’ye not think you’re rushing into things a bit too soon?’ he said. ‘Would you not give yourself a chance to go to college first before you start having a load of babies?’ But I knew that my grandfather was secretly delighted for me. I loved John dearly. His problems and his drinking had caused a lot of damage, but I didn’t hold any resentment or hard feelings towards him, and I always knew where I stood with him. He never minced his words and neither did I—I had always stood up to him and he respected me for this.

  For the first six weeks of the pregnancy I was in a daze. I just couldn’t get my head around it, but I knew that I was happy. Then one day Patrick rang me. There was something different about his voice. He told me that he had something that he wanted to tell me. But he didn’t have to tell me. I knew exactly what it was. He had used drugs.

  I went to meet Patrick and I prayed to God that I was wrong. But the minute I saw his eyes, I realised I was right. Even though I knew that one of us could have a relapse, I still had big hopes that we wouldn’t. I was heartbroken. I understood how hard it was to stop using once the cycle had been started. The dilemma I faced now was to either walk away from Patrick or to stand by him until he got strong again. It wasn’t a difficult decision for me to make. I loved him dearly and I was carrying his child. I wasn’t going to give up on him that quickly. But this would be dangerous for me, I knew that. I was putting my recovery at risk by standing by him. He told me that he didn’t want to go back using drugs and that he would do everything possible to get himself back on the right road. I was under no illusion that I could carry Patrick or save him. Sure, nobody could save me. So I held my breath and I prayed to God that Patrick would save himself.

  Within a few months Patrick had lost his apartment in transitional housing. He was no longer in his day programme, his music deal had gone down the drain and he was in the middle of a full-blown relapse. I was still completely drug-free and standing by him the best way I could, but protecting myself from Patrick’s addiction was the most important thing. I topped up on my meetings, stayed around my friends and continued to go to my after-care in Keltoi, but everyone around me was getting worried. ‘Patrick is a lovely fella, but you have to let him go,’ they said. ‘If he wants to use drugs, then that’s his choice.’ But I just couldn’t walk away from him. My heart wouldn’t allow me to. How could I just leave someone I loved when he was crying out for help?

  So I ended up doing the opposite to what everyone told me to do. I moved into a flat with Patrick in the hope that this would help him to get clean. He did, but only for a couple of weeks. I was devastated by Patrick’s relapse. I stood by and watched as Patrick continued to destroy himself. The Patrick I had met in Keltoi was quickly being replaced by addict man. I lived with Patrick for five months while he was actively using drugs. He somehow managed to keep it all away from me, but I didn’t need to see Patrick using drugs to be weakened by his addiction. I had learned from experience that addiction was stronger than me and it was already beginning to show its ugly little head again. By now I was heavily pregnant and the thoughts of being a single mother really frightened me. I tried to keep myself occupied by achieving my goals and starting college, but it was only a matter of time before thoughts of using drugs entered my mind. I couldn’t go back using drugs. I remembered people telling me that pain had no memory and this had been true for me every other time I had been clean. But not this time round: I vividly remembered the loneliness and desperation of my last relapse. I remembered the promise that I had made to myself to never give anyone or anything that power over me to make me go back using drugs. Patrick was far from ready to stop using. He was beyond human aid and it was something that I just had to accept.

  _____

  On 13 March 2008, I gave birth by caesarean section to a beautiful baby boy. I had been in labour for twenty-three hours and at the time it felt worse than my whole addiction put together. Nobody had told me that giving birth could be so traumatic. Patrick was by my side through it all. He was adamant that his addiction wouldn’t stop him from witnessing the birth of his baby boy. I had been knocked out with gas through the labour, and by the time I got to see our baby Patrick had him bathed and dressed. My mother, my grandmother and Philip were also there proudly looking on. Laying my eyes on our baby was the most magical moment of my life. He was so tiny and perfect and he had come from me. I couldn’t believe it.

  All my fears about whether or not I could cope with being a mother disappeared into the air. Myself and Senán bonded straight away. He was my little angel and everything I had been through was worth it just to see his beautiful little face. That night as I lay with Senán in my arms I thought about my life and all that had happened. I had been to hell and back again. I thought about my own mother and father and their inability to be there for me and to give me the love and stability that I needed. My heart broke at the thought of Senán going through the same thing. I held Senán as close to me as I could and I promised him that I would always be there for him. I wouldn’t make the same mistakes that my mother and father had made. I would never abandon him.

  But I felt so sad thinking of him growing up without a daddy. Patrick’s using was completely out of control now. I knew that he was devastated about his relapse and his inability to be there one hundred percent for myself and Senán. He didn’t seem to have much more fight left in him and I knew that now was the time I would have to walk away. Leaving Patrick was one of the hardest things I ever had to do. I felt as though I were going to die and I cried until I couldn’t cry any more. But it wasn’t about what I wanted now. It was about what was best for our son.

  I knew in my heart that Patrick adored Senán and that he would never do anything to hurt him in any way. But I wasn’t dealing with Patrick any more. I was dealing with his addiction, and his addiction couldn’t be trusted. The same way my addiction couldn’t be trusted when I was active. I was getting to see addiction now from the other side of the fence. I was getting to see it through my family’s eyes. Watching Patrick destroy himself was like watching myself all over again, but without any drugs to numb the pain.

  I moved in with my mother and Philip. My mother was a huge support to me around this time. She was my voice of reason. Every part of me wanted to run back to Patrick, but she gently reminded me that I had a child now and I had to put him first. The neck of her, I thought to myself. Who does she think she is, giving me advice on being a mother? Living with my mother now wasn’t easy, but I reminded myself that the past was over and my mother was doing her best to be there for me.

  Although I had removed myself physically from Patrick, I still wanted him to have contact with Senán. Drug addict or no, Patrick would still know his son and Senán would know his daddy. It was important for them both. Even though he was actively using drugs, he was great with Senán. But it was gut-wrenching watching them spend time together. They adored each other. Patrick would sing to him, as I stood there, not knowing whether to strangle him or wrap my arms around him. His addiction had ruined everything. But I knew that he felt worse about it than I did. He was homeless now, living on the streets and suffering so much because he had made that one mistake, using heroin. In spite of everything, my heart was very much with Patrick.

  _____

  More than two years have passed since I put a drug or a drink into my body and people tell me that I am a totally different person now to the woman I once was. The wounds on my arms have healed although the scars are there to remind me every day. I’ve been told that the hepatitis C is no longer detectable in my body. It amazes me to think that I put myself through all that and nearly killed myself in the process, all because I was afraid to feel. Now I know that the only way to get through something is to go through it. I have been through a lot and sometimes when I’m down I grieve
my losses, but I don’t give the negative thoughts any power. I no longer act impulsively. I know that no matter how strong the urge is to do something, that doesn’t mean I have to do it. I am bigger than my feelings and my thoughts. Everything passes and I still have hope.

  I no longer look for other people or things to fix me. It would be easy to do that, but how I feel about myself doesn’t depend on what others think of me. These days, I try to look deep within myself for that higher part of me that is tenacious, considerate of others, gentle and understanding. I no longer believe that I am a bad person.

  But I know that if I hadn’t experienced all that I have done, I wouldn’t be the person that I am today. I have been given a second chance at life and the opportunity to heal the damage that I have done. This applies particularly to my family. I have come to the conclusion that even if my mother had been there for me and none of what happened to me had happened, I would probably still have ended up on heroin. There were many factors which contributed to my becoming an addict, but I don’t blame my family any more.

  My relationship with my mother isn’t perfect, but we are on the right road. Having a child of my own has made me understand more how difficult it is to be a good parent. My mother has admitted that she has made mistakes and she spends most of her time trying to make up for lost time. We are still learning to communicate with each other and we are both learning to forgive.

  My uncle Laurence has never really got over the damage that my addiction caused: he was very close to it all, ferrying me to Cuba and back and living at home whilst I was going through the worst of it. But it seems that the longer I stay clean, the more he is beginning to trust me. The rest of my family are simply happy to see me alive, drug-free and still half intact. Especially my grandmother. She is my rock and someone whose love I am eternally grateful for.

  Along the road of my recovery I have also been given the chance to mend fences with old friends. I bumped into my old friend Katie one day when I was visiting my grandparents in Ballymun. She still looked exactly the same. At first I just walked past her, giving her a nervous hello. But I knew in my heart that I had to apologise for any harm I had caused her. And I had caused her harm, using her identity on one occasion when I had been arrested for shop-lifting. When I hadn’t turned up in court, a bench warrant was issued to her address. Katie had to go to court in order to sort it all out.

  Nonetheless, I decided to approach Katie and say all that I needed to say to her. Katie told me that she wasn’t one bit happy about being brought to court, but she was delighted to see me doing so well. She went on to tell me about how guilty she felt when I started to use drugs and she couldn’t hang around with me any more. She had blamed herself and she had thought about me a lot over the years. Within a few minutes myself and Katie were laughing and joking about the good old days in Sillogue. It was as though it was only yesterday when we had all sat around on crates, smoking hash and listening to Bob Marley. Since then myself and Katie have stayed in contact and we have become good friends again.

  When I started college I was shocked to discover that my old NA sponsor, Katriona, was my psychology lecturer. As soon as we got the chance to be alone, we had a good little cry over everything that had happened. We were laughing and crying at the same time and Katriona was only too happy to offer to be my sponsor again. But I got a real blast from my past when I ran into Derek one day in town. I couldn’t believe my eyes. He looked like a different person. I had heard that he was clean, but I wasn’t sure if this was true. At first we both just said hello. But after bumping into him time after time, we ended up having a chat. He told me that he was drug-free. He was studying in college and he was trying to make a better life for himself. He told me that he was haunted by memories of his addiction and of the hard time he had given me: he would have to live with those memories for the rest of his life and he was truly sorry. I needed to say sorry, too: for all the harm that I had caused Derek, because I knew in my heart that I had. I knew by him that he was still scarred by it all and so was I. But I was happy in the knowledge that we had both made our peace and now we could really move on.

  Big Mick, my partner and mentor, had died four years before my recovery and I had been devastated at the time. But it was only now that I realised just what a role he had played in my recovery. When he died, I felt guilty that I couldn’t be there after all he’d done for me and guilty that I hadn’t made my peace with him fully. Apart from my grandmother, Big Mick was the one person who always believed in me and never gave up on me. He wanted nothing more than to see me get clean and stay clean. I never got the chance to show him how grateful I was. But I know that he is there in some way, watching over me still.

  The one person with whom I haven’t been able to build bridges is my father, perhaps because we never had a real relationship in the first place, but I met him not so long ago and we talked. I wanted closure and to hear in his own words why he wasn’t there when I was a child. I was expecting him to point the finger at others, but he took full responsibility: ‘I couldn’t be there for personal reasons and I had to abide by that,’ he told me, no doubt referring to the barring order which my family took out against him and which I knew about. ‘But I always thought about you and wanted to see you. I’m here for you now,’ he finished. But this wasn’t enough for me—isn’t enough. Too much damage has been done.

  One person who reminds me how far I’ve come is my friend Neil. It broke my heart to leave him behind in active addiction, and I wasn’t willing to walk away without trying to help him first. He got clean not so long after me and he now lives in India with his mother. We are still best friends and he never lets me forget where I’m coming from. I’ve also made some really good friends since coming clean. My friend Chris made his way back from his relapse and he spends most of his time travelling the world trying to spread the message of recovery. He is still one of my most trusted friends. Myself and Declan are still very close. He is now a qualified psychotherapist who works with active drug users and is someone I am blessed to have as a friend. But I have yet to meet anyone like Patrick. All through his addiction I still loved him dearly. I tried to help him in any way that I could but without putting myself in danger. I can never take from Patrick the love that he has for his son or the encouragement that he always gave me to keep moving forward even though he was stuck with the drugs. I still love and cherish him and always will.

  After a long battle with his addiction, Patrick is now drug-free and on the road to recovery. He has crawled his way back from active addiction and is living with his sister, who was one of my biggest supports all through Patrick’s relapse. She knew exactly what I was going through and she was always there to let me know that I was never alone.

  I am now in college studying psychotherapy and counselling and working towards getting a degree. I have no idea what I would like to do in the future, but it involves giving back in some form or another. Going into schools and giving talks to children about the dangers of drugs is something that I do regularly. I find this work to be so rewarding. I still have a strong feeling of loyalty towards NA and I attend meetings almost every week. If not for myself, then for others. NA has taught me almost everything I know. And the most important thing I try to implement in my life is the constant thought of others. It’s not always easy when you have spent fourteen years thinking about nobody but yourself. But I try my best. Having a baby doesn’t give me the leisure to be selfish. And I thank God for this. Senán is the most precious, beautiful gift that I have ever been given and most days he keeps me going. In the beginning of my recovery doing the right things was alien to me. But now, after going against the grain every day, doing the right things is mostly instinctive for me. I have learned the hard way that addiction has nothing to do with the drugs. It is something that is still with me even now and I can never underestimate its power. The day that I stop being true to myself will be the day that I go back using drugs. Every day I do my best to apply spiritual principles t
o my life: acceptance, honesty, faith and lots of laughter. For now, I can safely say that I am living a life beyond my wildest dreams.

  COPYRIGHT PERMISSIONS

  Page 40: ‘It’s ’orrible being in love when you’re 8½’ words and music by Dheverani Coleman © 1986, reproduced by permission of EMI Music Publishing Ltd, London w8 5SW.

  Page 44: ‘Wild World’ words and music by Yusuf Islam © 1970, reproduced by permission of EMI Music Publishing Ltd, London w8 5SW.

  Page 63: ‘Narcotic Influence’ by Empirion, written by Morsley, published by AMV Talpa GmbH, reproduced by permission of Reverb XL.

  The author and publisher have made every effort to trace all copyright holders, but if any has been inadvertently overlooked we would be pleased to make the necessary arrangement at the first opportunity.

  CONTACTS

  Cenacolo Community, tel 094 9388 286,

  email cenacolocommunityireland@yahoo.ie

  Coolmine Therapeutic Community, Headquarters, Coolmine House, 19 Lord Edward Street, Dublin 1, tel 01 679 4822, email declanarthur@gmail.com, www.coolmine.ie

  Cuan Dara, Drug Detoxification Unit, Cherry Orchard Hospital, Ballyfermot, Dublin 10, tel 620 6050, fax 623 5835